Bound and Chained: Edge of Reason
by Miss Ria
Summary: Set in 2001. Because of his ego, Chris Jericho finds himself in a situation he can't get out of, and his worst nightmare comes true when the person he loves the most gets pulled in with him. Will his desire to fight come too late? Contains an OC.
1. Prologue

**Bound and Chained : Edge of Reason  
Prologue**

**_Disclaimer_**  
WWE belongs to those that own WWE. Original characters are mine. Don't steal, don't sue.

**_Author's Notes_**  
Set in 2001, after the end of The Power Trip days. For a refresher, at Wrestlemania X-7, Triple H and Stone Cold Steve Austin joined forces and wreaked havoc for awhile. It ended when Triple H tore his quadriceps after Judgment Day 2001 in a match with Chris Jericho and Chris Benoit. From that point on, I'm creating my own universe in which Steve Austin continued alone in his own version of The Power Trip, without the aid of Mr. McMahon. Because of the timeline of the story, the company is still called the WWF. If it continues past the Invasion, which as far as I've planned, it shouldn't, the name change will be reflected. Also, in my timeline, Edge and Christian have been broken up for about a year. While there may be some canonical mentions, for the most part, I've changed most of the story.

* * *

When she introduced herself, trying to hide the nervousness, she noticed the man eyeing her up and down, examining her as if she was a piece of meat and he was a starving man. She fought to keep back the shudder that she knew wanted to overcome her, and instead jutted out her chin, trying to appear stubborn and strong. She certainly didn't feel that way. The man in front of her was an intimidating figure, despite the welcoming smile on his face. There was something about him that she didn't like; she just couldn't put her finger on it.

"Mind if I call you Lauren?" he asked, releasing the hand that he had been shaking, giving her another look.

"Please do," she said, hoping to hell that he hadn't heard the quiver in her voice when she spoke.

He gestured into the house and stepped back for her to walk in, closing the door behind her. "We'll talk in the living room. Anything to drink? Water, coffee, beer?" he offered, leading her to the aforementioned room.

"Coffee would be nice," she answered faintly, faltering for a moment as she came into the room. Looking around herself, she swallowed thickly, before going to the couch that he had gestured to. "Black, please." He nodded and left the room for a moment, leaving her alone to examine her surroundings. Most of it was what she had anticipated when he had offered to hold the meeting at his house. It was filled with masculine looking leather furniture, a large screen television dominating one wall. And around her, mounted to the walls and on tables were various animals and animal heads. "Do you hunt?" she asked politely when he walked back into the room, two mugs of coffee in his hands.

He handed one over to her and looked around the room as well. "Yeah, it's a hobby of mine. When I get a chance to. Makes a man feel alive, makes him feel superior." He looked back down at her and grinned, taking an arm chair near her. "Do you?"

"Oh, no. I mean, I have. Before. Our dad took us out with him once, but I didn't really care for it. Too messy. I'd rather cook and eat the meat than go out and get it myself."

"Huh," he said, as if it were a statement. "It's how man began. Hunters and gatherers. It was survival."

She laughed weakly, looking away from him. "Thank God we've evolved since then. Otherwise, I'd be going hungry."

An uncomfortable silence fell between them as both man and woman sipped their coffee, his eyes on her the whole time, her trying to avoid looking at him. "You know, you don't look like brother and sister," he offered, watching as her head came up in surprise from where she was investigating the grain of his hardwood floor.

"Oh!" She sounded surprised. "We had different mothers, but for the most part, we were raised together. He's my half-brother," she said dumbly, before shaking her head, and mumbling, "But I guess you figured that out."

"What I'm not understanding is why you're here. You asked for this meeting, Lauren. Wanna tell me what it's about?"

She took a deep breath and leaned forward slightly. "I'm worried about him, sir. For one thing, I haven't heard from him in just about a year, which is odd for him. He used to call me every two weeks, no matter what was going on. I've tried to get in contact with him, but he doesn't answer his phone when I call, and he doesn't return any of my messages."

"You're worried about him," the man said matter-of-factly.

"Our dad passed away six months ago," she murmured.

"I'm sorry to hear that."

She offered him a tentative smile. "He never came to the funeral. He never came to help me clean out the house. He never came to the will reading. I know he's contacted Dad's lawyer, but if he came out, he did it after I was gone. He's been avoiding me, and for the life of me, I can't figure out why. He keeps up with all of his payments and everything, but he doesn't talk to me. And he doesn't look right."

"How so?"

"He's changed, sir. Maybe you didn't know him well enough a year and a bit ago, but he's changed. He's not the same. That's not my half brother that I see on my television every week. I don't know who that is, but he looks so frustrated, so tired. That's not him. My brother is the type of person that's always smiling, no matter what's happening, and I haven't seen him smile in ages. I know him," she said again, with a tone that left no room for argument.

The man nodded slowly. "He does seem different, doesn't he? You know, when I heard that your father had passed away, I offered him as much time as he needed to go back home and deal with his affairs. He declined the offer."

A look of hurt entered her eyes, and he mentally amended his previous statement of them looking nothing alike. They had the same eyes, and that was the same expression that he had seen in her brother's eyes before. They had eyes that one could read easily, as if they were open books with the print in clear view. "I didn't know."

"I can't make him take time off, Lauren. It doesn't work that way. I can offer it, but you have to realize, he's one of our better performers. It would be a big loss of money to take him off of television right now. I don't know what you want me to do."

She sagged back on the couch, looking down at the cup of coffee in her hands. "I understand, sir. I just...there has to be some way for me to get in contact with him, to figure out what's wrong. I don't know what happened to him, but he's not happy. Is there anyway that I could get backstage for awhile, maybe talk to him? I can take a semester off from school. That's not a problem."

The man looked at her, and the wheels began turning in his head. He could see so many opportunities with the young woman sitting in front of him, so many ways that he could use her to make things go his way, and he leaned back, considering them all. There was no doubt that some of the traits that her brother had, she also had. She wasn't as charismatic at him, no, but then there were few people that were. But there was a beauty and grace to her that could be exploited for the company. Exploited for him. "Now, Lauren, I'm sorry to tell you this, but that isn't the way it works. Oh, we have no problem with family coming to visit once in awhile, but for an extended time like that? There's just no way."

"I have to do something," she said passionately. "Please, you have to help me. Help us."

He paused, as if he were thinking about her situation, when he knew he had made up his mind all along. Oh, he had made up his mind as soon as she had called him, begging for a meeting. He had seen a picture of her before, one that her half-brother kept in his wallet, and although she was younger in the photograph, even then she could have been considered attractive.

He supposed that the brother and sister together would make a striking pair. He had those all American good looks, tanned and fit, and a face that caused women to scream for him. The sister, on the other hand, was darker skinned and brunette, with a body that looked like she enjoyed the occasional outdoor sport. Probably a golfer or tennis player, he figured, the type of girl that would go jogging in the mornings. She was in shape, but certainly not athletic looking. "Well, there is one thing that I could think of doing, but it would take longer than a semester. A year, actually."

"I...I don't understand," she said dully, finally meeting his eyes. She forced herself not to shiver at the coldness in them.

"I could offer you a year long contract, which would give you access to your brother any time that you wanted at the shows. But you would have to work for me. It's not always a fun job, Lauren. There's a lot of traveling and injuries and not much sleep...but I guess you know that, what with who your brother is. If you agree to this, I'll set you up with someone to give you a few quick training sessions. I don't anticipate you having to go out there and wrestling, but you'll need to know how to protect yourself. Especially if...well, I guess I really shouldn't go that far, since I don't know if you're gonna do this or not."

She shook her head. "No, please. Go on."

He nodded slowly. "Well, the way I see it, one way to ensure contact between you would be to make you your brother's manager or valet. You'd go out with him during his matches. But like I said, I'd want to make sure that you don't get hurt out there, so you'd need to know the basics. It won't be fun or easy, and it'll probably take a month or so, but then we could have you out there and you could be with your brother."

"Oh, I don't know," she said faintly. "I never wanted to be a wrestler. That's my brother's world, not mine. I've been in school for the past few years, studying to become a -"

"This is my only offer, Lauren. It's the only thing that I can think of doing."

Swallowing thickly, she turned away for a moment and found herself staring into the dull eyes of a deer head mounted on the wall. Her lips curled briefly before she looked away, no wanting to look at the dead thing. "I understand. I...I suppose that it would work, but I'd want to look over the contract," she murmured, chancing a look at the man.

He smiled brightly, and there was that overwhelming urge to shudder again. "Good. It'll take a week to get the lawyers to draw one up. That should give you enough time to go back home and get your affairs in order. Why don't I give you a call and fly you back out when it's all arranged? Then, you can sign and we'll get you into training. I know just the person to help you, too."

The sinking feeling she had wasn't as strong as the joy at the thought of seeing her brother again, and trying to reconnect with him. He could see it written plainly on her face, and he fought to keep his smile to himself.

Yeah, she could be used to his advantage. And when he was done with her...well, he really didn't care what happened after that.

* * *

A week and a half later, she was back in his house, in the same living room with the stuffed and mounted animals around her. She was better prepared that time around, and fought back against the revulsion over his choice of decor. "So, this is it?" she asked, flipping through the pages of the contract he had handed her.

"That's it. A contract good for one year, with an option to renew for another three, including a rising pay scale." He caught the look he gave her and offered her a smile that was somewhat innocent. "Standard language for a one year contract." She nodded absently and flipped back to the first page, beginning to read it slowly. "I promise you, there's no hidden clauses or anything that I can take advantage of."

"Uh huh," she replied, continuing to read.

The man was quiet until she got to the bottom of the first page, flipping it to the second and still reading. "You just have to sign it," he said a bit gruffly, before pushing a pen in her direction.

She looked up, and for a moment, annoyance flashed over her face. "I'm a law student, sir, and even if I wasn't, common knowledge is that you don't sign anything before reading it thoroughly. For instance, this says that you have complete control over my time while I'm an employee of yours. What exactly does that mean?"

He shrugged and leaned back, resisting the urge to snarl something hateful at her. He managed to control the urge, just barely, and instead, plastered a smile on his face. "It's simple. If you walk out with anyone, I say who you walk out with. If you have a match, I say whether or not you can have that match. If you want to dye your hair electric blue, it's well within my rights to say no, and you wouldn't be able to. Like I said, standard language for a contract for a new employee with the WWF."

She frowned slightly and looked at the pen sitting on the coffee table. "That's the problem. This doesn't say that I'm an employee of the World Wrestling Federation. This says that I'm _your_ employee, under _your_ guidance and control. Why is that?"

"Because if you wanted a contract with the WWF, you'd have to be a wrestler, and you'd have to show them that you know how to wrestle. You're not a wrestler, and _my_ contract stipulates that I can hire my own employees and by extension, they work for the WWF. Your brother is under a similar contract with me."

"Half brother," she correctly absently, going back to the contract.

"Look, you came to me, Lauren. Your _half_ brother won't talk to you on his time off, and you want to get in contact with him while he's working. I'm trying to give you that access, give you that chance, but you should know that this is the only contract that I'm going to be offering you. Either you sign your name to it and take it, or you walk away. You will lose your only chance if you don't sign this contract. So what does it really matter what it says? Yes or no, Lauren. Either sign the damned thing or walk out the door right now."

She sat back and looked at the pen again, weighing her options. She knew he was right, and that's what she hated more than anything. This was her only chance to get at her brother. If only once, just once, he had called her back or actually picked up the phone when she had tried calling, it never would have come to that. She never would have been sitting on that man's couch, with a contract sitting on her lap.

Against her better judgement, she flipped the contract over to the last page, seeing the spot that was waiting for her signature, a small post-it pointing to the right spot. She leaned forward and picked up the pen, rolling it between her fingers for a moment, before she looked back at the man, sitting on the edge of his chair, waiting for her to sign.

"Your only chance, kid," he said sternly.

She nodded and swallowed down the lump in her throat before clicking the pen and putting the point to the paper, scrawling her signature on the allotted line and then filling in the line for the date. She printed her full name on the space below that. Closing the contract, she laid it down on the table and put the pen on top of it, meeting his eyes.

"I'll have a copy sent to your address by the end of the week," he promised her, knowing that it was a promise he was going to break.

"Thank you," she said faintly.

* * *

She sat up on the ring apron, accepting the bottle of warm water as it was passed over to her. Making a face, she uncapped it and drank deeply. "Trust me, you don't want cold water after that," the young man told her, boosting himself up so that he could sit beside her. He adjusted his ponytail and took the bottle when she handed it back.

"I know," she gasped, pushing her own sweaty hair out of her face. "When I jog, I usually keep a bottle out on the counter for when I get back. I just don't like it."

He laughed, a bit breathlessly, but not as bad as she was, and recapped the bottle, putting it down beside him. "You're doing great, Lauren. I'd say you're ready."

She wrinkled her nose, sagging back against the bottom rope. "I can barely do a suplex. At least I know how to punch and kick. And hey, I have nails," she joked, flashing her hand at him. He smiled when he saw how broken and ragged they looked from the work they had been putting in recently.

"I weigh over a hundred pounds more than you. I'm not surprised that you can barely get me off the ground. Besides, you're not supposed to be a wrestler. I'm just trying to keep you from getting hurt if you get knocked around out there."

"How to fall on your ass safely, 101. You know, they didn't cover that at my school. Does that mean I should start calling your Professor Christian?"

He chuckled and slid off the edge of the ring, before offering her a hand. She jumped down next to him, groaning at the pull of her muscles. "C'mon. The sooner you hit the showers, the sooner we can go get something to eat. I'm starving."

"Fine, but it's on me," she said, pushing him slightly with her hip. They walked side by side down to the locker rooms, pausing for a moment. "Thanks, Christian. I definitely couldn't have done this without you. I really do appreciate it."

He smiled, although there was a bit of puzzlement to it. "Yeah, I just wonder if your brother is going to. Knowing my luck as of late, he's probably gonna try to kick my ass. From what I've heard about you, the little that he's talked about you recently, I don't think he wanted you in the world. He said you were in law school, had a couple of years to go before you graduate."

"Taking a year off won't put me that far behind. People start a lot later than I did. I started right out of high school, with pre-law. I actually have a bit of a leg up on most." She shook her head. "What do you mean, what little he talks about me?"

He shrugged. "Well, awhile back, he talked about you a lot. I mean, a lot. Almost every day, he'd mention you. It got to the point where we'd want to throttle him, and there were a few rumours that you were just a figment of his imagination, since no one had ever met you. He was constantly talking about you being in school and how proud he was that you were doing so well."

"Proud? He's never once told me that he was proud of me."

"Doesn't mean he wasn't," Christian said with another shrug. "You're his little sister. I don't think there's anything out there that he loves more than you, but awhile ago, it just changed. Now, he barely mentions you, and when I asked him, he said that he didn't even know what you were up to. I just thought that you guys had a falling out. I mean, siblings fighting is something that I can understand."

"Yeah," she said softly, thinking about what he had told her about himself and his own brother. "It wasn't anything like that, though. I'm not sure what happened. But that's why I'm here, to find out."

He pushed himself off of the wall and stood in front of her, his hands on her shoulders. "Look, I know that you don't really know me, and we haven't been around each other all that much, but I consider you to be a friend. Not to mention, you're the little sister of one of my friends. I just...I'm worried that he's not going to take this well, and you're going to suffer because of it." He paused and cocked his head to the side, as she looked up at him with wide eyes. "Why don't you travel with me, at least for the first week? I'll have my hotel reservation changed to a double room. It's just...you know. A safety net."

With a smile on her face, she reached up and patted one of his hands. "That sounds like a good idea, Christian, thanks. I don't know what I'd have done without you."

He grinned and let go of her, pushing open the door to the men's locker room. "Fall on your butt a little less safely, probably. Now go, shower, get changed. I'm really really hungry."

She sketched a quick salute as she pushed open the door to the women's locker room. "Sir, yes, sir."

* * *

The crowd was their indicator. If they weren't into the match, there would be a silence that could be louder than the cheers and yells. They would ramp it up in the ring when that loud silence came around. First and foremost, they were entertainers, but they were also fighting each other for the biggest prizes in the industry. No matter how flashy and exciting they would get, they were still brutal, pushing their own bodies and their opponents bodies to the very limit. The crowd responded accordingly. They cheered for the good guys and booed the bad guys, and they reacted to the unexpected.

He gasped for breath as he sat in the corner of the ring, one arm draped over the ring ropes to break up any sort of count or submission move that his opponent could come at him with. His ring awareness was just one thing that made him so damned good at his job. Another was his ability to read the audience. Only this time, he didn't have to read them. They were like an open book.

When the boos and jeering started, he wasn't sure why. He was the bad guy, according to the fans, and he had barely twitched a finger, let alone moved against his opponent. Which could only mean that someone had come out there, with the idea of helping him win, which was something that he couldn't particularly believe. There was only one person in the back that he associated with by choice, and he knew that Christian had a match of his own soon after his was done. There was no way the man would risk getting hurt before his own match.

Groaning, he forced his head back down and opened his eyes, looking blearily towards the ramp. He cursed and blinked, feeling the sweat drip into his eyes and irritate them further than normal. Damn not being able to wear his glasses in the ring; he hated his contact lenses. His vision cleared and he found himself gaping at the sight on top of the ramp.

He knew that it was impossible for her to be there, and yet there she was, standing at the top of the ramp with a hesitant smile on her face. Because he recognized that particular shade of light brown skin that he always called _coffee with a wallop of cream_, if only because she would make that annoyed face he knew too well and screech that the right word was _dollop_, damn it. Because he recognized that brown hair that stuck out like a sore thumb in the family of blond-haired people. Because he recognized that damned leather jacket that he had bought her years ago.

And he looked beside her, to see the smirking large man beside her, dressed in his usual tee shirt and long denim shorts. For a moment, he thought that his heart stopped beating, that he stopped breathing, that everything just became freeze frame as he stared at the two of them, unable to believe his own eyes. And then the world came back to life, and he found himself rolling out of the ring, ignoring the referee that shouted he was going to start the ten count if he didn't get his ass back between the ropes immediately. The shouted count barely registered in his head as his expression changed, became stony. He glared at the man, not wanting to show just how much the sight of them standing there together was affecting him.

The thought of him standing next to his sister, holding onto her arm loosely...he fought back against the snarl that felt like ripping its way through his chest and started towards the ramp, his eyes fiery. The count was up to six at that point, and he didn't give a shit. All he could think about was getting him away from her. His footfalls were heavy on the metal ramp, and he walked with a purpose, anger radiating from every part of him.

The crowd continued to boo, yelling at him, calling him a coward, a pussy, a loser, and he didn't care. He just couldn't care. They didn't know that standing on the ramp there, standing there with that bit of a smile and that uncertain expression, was the most important thing in his life. He made his way to the top of the ramp and cold eyes met equally cold eyes as he reached out and grabbed his sister's wrist, pulling her forward and to his side, forcing the other man to let go of her.

The bell rang. The crowd booed. The announcer's voice over the speakers declared his opponent the winner by an out of the ring count out. The man in the ring looked confused but shrugged as the referee raised his hand.

And Chris Jericho stared down Stone Cold Steve Austin, the growl finally erupting from him, before he pulled his sister with him backstage.


	2. Chapter One

**Bound and Chained: Edge of Reason  
Chapter One**

"Chris. Damn it, Christopher, let go of me. You're hurting me!" Lauren Jericho said, a touch of whine in her voice, as he pulled her along by the wrist. "I'm gonna use my nails, you fucker."

"Just shut up," he snapped back at her, coming to a stop in front of a door. He pushed it open with his hip and pulled her inside, practically throwing her into the room as he released the hold he had on her wrist. She glared at him and flexed her hand, before rubbing her hand against the sore spot. His eyes were alight with anger as he turned to look at the man sitting on the bench, dressed in his gear and ready for his match. "Get out of here," he snapped.

"Like hell," Christian said with a bit of a snort, though his voice was friendlier than Jericho's had been. "I don't feel like going out there and getting jumped by the WWF locker room."

Clenching his jaw, Chris Jericho glared at the other man, before pointing to the door. "Get the hell out of here now so that I can talk to her alone."

Christian shrugged his shoulders, before bending down to continue lacing up his boots. "I already know that she's your sister."

"Yeah, well-" He broke off his tirade and stared stupidly at him. "What do you mean, 'you know'? You can't know."

Opening his mouth to answer, Christian stopped himself in time and looked at Lauren, unsure of how to continue. Lauren decided to do it for him. "Chris, do you think you could stop ranting and raving for a moment, so that we can actually talk? Or did you just want to throw me around a little more?" she asked, crossing her arms under her breasts and slouching.

Chris swore under his breath, recognizing the pose for what it was. How many times he had seen it before, directed at him, directed at their father. Coming home late from a party, half-drunk, and stumbling in the front door with laughter and a smile, the good nature dropping away when she saw either of them, giving her that look. She'd adopt that position, cocking a hip to the side, bending her knees slightly, as if she were waiting for a physical attack, and she'd glare back, ready to fight. How many times had he found her like that and reprimanded her, not comfortable with the idea of telling her how worried he had been and how disappointed he was, and how many times would she shout back that he wasn't her father, and better, not even a full blood brother, so why the hell would his opinion matter.

He looked at her speculatively and seemed to see her for the first time in years. There was a maturity to her face that hadn't been there before, that he had never noticed. There were bits of their father in her face, and to an extent, him. The nose was from the men of the family, though slightly more feminine. The eyes were identical to his, and the same medium blue. But the mouth with the fuller lips, and the rounded face came from her mother. She still didn't stand any taller than five foot four, and she looked to be in better shape than he had seen before, but it was the look in her eyes that made him stop. She looked old, the same way he looked old when he looked in the mirror, even though both of them could be considered young.

He shook his head and dropped his eyes to the floor, looking down at their last name emblazoned on the shin pads that extended over his boots. "Why are you here, Lauren?" he asked softly. Even to himself, he sounded pathetic, his voice worn and beaten and dejected. He wanted to be happy to see her. Hell, it had been ages since he had talked to his half-sister, let alone seen her, but he just couldn't make himself feel anything but worry.

She dropped her arms and stood up a bit straighter, the fight draining out of her body the same as it had for him. "I wanted to see you, Chris."

"I don't...did I miss a payment? Did you need new books?" He shook his head, discounting his own theories. "Right, you're in the middle of a semester. And my bank would have informed me if I missed any payments. Nothing happened at school, did it? You should be at school."

She swallowed thickly and shook her head. "No, I...uh, I'm taking a year off, Chris."

His head came up sharply and his eyes met hers. "What? Why?" he asked, shock coloring his voice. "You can't afford to. Do you know how far behind you're going to be if you take a year off?"

"I talked to the registrar. They'll refund the money for the semesters I haven't attended yet, but they can't for this semester."

"Lauren, have you lost your fucking mind?" He pushed a hand through his hair, and she bit her lip to stop herself from smiling at the sight of the signature 'Chris is perplexed' action. His tone of voice brought her back and made the smile drop from her face. "You can't do this. I'm not letting you throw away all these years at university because...why are you taking this time anyway?"

"I told you, I wanted to see you," she said, her tone becoming annoyed again.

He looked behind him when there was a knock at the door, and Christian, forgotten in the argument, stood up. "My match is up. Just give me a couple of minutes afterwards to shower and change, and I can take you back to the hotel."

"Thanks, Christian."

Jericho's eyes looked like they were about to pop out of his head as Christian left the locker room, stopping the swinging door from continuing on its arc as he stepped out. "Oh, wait, lemme guess. You and Christian have been secretly dating for a few months, and you took a year off so that you two could go down to Vegas and get hitched, and you guys want me to be the best man."

"God, do you even listen to the shit that comes out of your mouth sometimes?"

He took a threatening step towards her, eyes blazing. "How in the hell do you know him, Lauren? Because I know that you've never met him before."

"I met him a couple weeks ago. He's been training me."

"Train - Training you? Christian's never _trained_ anyone before. What the fuck do you mean, _training_ you?" he exclaimed, throwing his hands up in the air. "What in the holy blue hell is going on around here? Last time I talked to you, you were in school and watching wrestling when you didn't have a study group, not _training_ to be a wrestler. God, I think I'm going crazy. That's gotta be it. I've lost my mind. Tell me that I've lost my mind!" he roared at her.

Rather than cringing away from him, like most women would when faced with an irate Chris Jericho, she leaned forward, her eyes narrowed in defiance. "It seems that you lost it a long time ago, you dork."

"No!" He raised a finger in her face, pointing skyward. "No, no. No. We are not starting this. You are not distracting me. You're going to tell me what the hell you're doing here, and before you even think of opening your mouth, telling me that you're here to see me doesn't work. I want a real answer."

She shook her head. "You want a lot of things, Christopher. But you can't always get what you want."

"Do not quote Stones songs to me. Answer me, Lauren, because I swear, you may be too old, but you're smaller than me, and I can still put you over my knee."

She laughed suddenly. "Listen to you! You're not my father. You're not even-" Her mocking words were cut off by his raised finger again, though this time, he pushed the tip of it in her face.

"Don't say that," he choked out. "I hate it when you say that. Regardless of the fact that we have two different mothers, you are _still_ my sister, and you are my _only_ sister. Don't give me that shit about being my half-sister, Lauren."

She batted his finger out of her face and then grabbed hold of his forearm, holding it against her own arm. The difference between his tanned skin and her naturally light brown skin was obvious. "Oh, yeah, we're brother and sister all right."

His anger had brought him to his breaking point. He reached forward and grabbed hold of her shoulders, pulling her close to him. "Fuck you, Lauren. I'm tired of this. You are my sister. Period. You lived in our house, we had the same father, we grew up together. You are my sister, and I am your brother. Your really irritated and pissed off brother, but your brother. You slept in the room beside mine. We celebrated birthdays together. You have always been my sister. And next time that you say that you're not, so help me God, you won't be. That'll be it, Lauren. No more money, no more help, nothing. I'll be gone and you can go on your own merry fucking way."

She blinked and stared at her half-brother, his face red with his anger and his breathing heavy against her face. "Chris, I..." Lauren trained off, unsure of how to finish her sentence. Half of her wanted to shout out as loud as she could that they weren't traditionally brother and sister, but the more rational realizing that when Chris made a statement like that, he went through with it, and that thought was more frightening to her than she wanted to admit. As he continued to stare at her, she could feel her eyes fill with tears, and then slip down her face.

Sighing, he moved his hands from her shoulders to her face, cradling it gently and wiping away the tears as they fell with his thumb. "Why are you here, Lauren? Honestly."

"I missed you. I was worried about you," she whispered, shaking in his hold.

His expression softened, his eyes becoming kind as he continued to clean her face of her tears. "Go home, Laurie. I'm fine. I'm okay. You don't have to worry about me. Just go home and go back to school. We can call the registrar in the morning, and get you back in your classes."

"What happened to you, Chris?" she asked.

He brought her towards him, despite the fact that he had just been in a match. There was no doubt in his mind that he definitely didn't smell like roses, and most of the sweat that had accumulated on him had dried, but he wrapped his arms around her nonetheless, rocking his younger sister as she cried against his bare shoulder. "I don't know, sweetie. But I'm here now. I'm here."

Cupping the back of her head with one of his large hands, he used his thumb and forefinger to massage the sides of her neck, just like their father used to do to them when they were younger. She burrowed closer against him, sniffling when his other hand moved up and down her back comfortingly. He had a feeling that this moment was a long time in coming for them. It had been the elephant in the corner of the room since they were teenagers, and he had been dreading the day it was to come. "I'm sorry," she murmured against his shoulder.

"No, Laurie, it's okay. You have nothing to be sorry about," he crooned in her ear. "I just wish that you'd realize how much I love you. You're my sister. How could I not?"

That made her cry harder, just he knew it would. But he needed to say it, and she needed to hear it. Chris continued to rock her, tucking her head under his chin and sighing. "You're gonna hate me," she said sadly, pulling away from him. She reached out and wiped her hand against his shoulder, getting rid of the wetness there before wiping at her own face.

Chris made a face and stepped away. "Hold that thought," he told her, disappearing into the bathroom. She could hear him fumbling around for a moment before he returned, a roll of toilet paper in his hand. He gave her a crooked smile. "I don't think they'll miss this."

She laughed, a watery laugh, and took it from him, ripping off a significant amount and rubbing the tears off her skin, before blowing her nose. "Gross," she said, before wadding up the tissue and throwing it towards the trash can.

"Said it before I could." He shook his head when she offered the roll of toilet paper to him. "Nah, a few little sister tears on me isn't going to kill me. 'Sides, I still need to shower and change. I think I'll live."

She took a deep breath and looked at him, playing with the roll of toilet paper. He watched as she shredded the first piece nervously. "I can't go home, Chris. It's not that...I made a mistake."

"What happened? Do I need to beat someone up? You were seeing some guy, weren't you?"

"A year and a half ago, before you stopped talking to me," she answered, before sighing. "Sorry, I don't mean to sound so...bitchy."

He grinned finally, that same bright grin that made the women in the audience go wild, but his sister just barely returned it with a smile of her own. One that wavered and fell within seconds. "What are you..." And then he stopped, because he had managed to put two and two together and came out with four. His little sister, dressed in a pair of jeans and her favourite pin striped blouse, dressed in the leather jacket that he had bought her for her birthday two years ago. Full makeup, hair freshly cut and styled. Standing on top of the ramp at the WWF live event. At RAW, standing there during his match and not a single member of security had twitched and gone to move her away. Standing there next to Stone Cold Steve Austin. This wasn't just another one of Austin's mind games. No, this was something more serious, more dangerous, than he had wanted to think about.

That could only mean one thing, and he could feel his stomach dropping, his heart skipping a beat. "Oh, Laurie, tell me you didn't sign anything. Please tell me that you didn't."

She shrugged her shoulders. "I didn't," she said softly. "But that's a lie. Because we both know that I did."

"Was it with one of the McMahons?" he asked, almost desperate, wishing, hoping, almost praying.

"No."

Now he felt like he was going to cry. "Not Austin."

"Yeah."

His shoulders dropped, as did his head. He covered his face with his hands and fought to keep his composure. He wanted to ruin something in the locker room, something, anything. He wanted to go and beat the crap out of Austin. He wanted to shake his sister by the shoulders to get some sense into her. He wanted to sit down and cry. He didn't know what he wanted to do. "God, Laurie..." he whispered, before sitting down heavily on the bench. He blinked and breathed deeply, trying to regain his composure after a blow that felt like getting slugged in the stomach.

Lauren felt scared. She could deal with Chris and his many powerful emotions for the most part. Anger and annoyance was a constant for them growing up. She had seen him upset. She had seen him cry a handful of times. She had seen him disappointed, heartbroken, incensed, giddy, thrilled...but she had never once seen him scared. Oh, sure, she had seen him spooked. There had been the night that he had been babysitting her and they had watched _Pet Semetary_, which when mixed with the windstorm and their own cat had produced terrifying results. And the night that she had gotten into a minor car accident at fifteen, before she was even legally able to drive, she had seen him spooked. But terrified...that was a new one for her.

Moving quickly, she bent down near his knee, her hands resting on it as she tried to peer into his face. But his long blond hair blocked her view. "Chris, it's all right. It's only a year, and then I can go back to school. I promise, I won't miss much. I mean, hell, there are people that start law school way later than me." She forced her voice to sound cheerful and carefree, but he didn't look up, just stared at the ground between his wrestling boots, turning pale despite his tan. "Chris, look at me, please. It's not that bad. Please, Christopher. You're scaring me."

That did it. He looked at her, shoving the hair out of his face and behind his ears. "Lauren, you don't understand. You don't know what you did."

She smiled, despite the fact that she could feel the tears coming back. "It's all right, I promise. It's only a year. Just a year. Just think about all the time we'll have together and all the things we'll get to do. It'll be fun."

He shook his head slowly. "No, Laurie, it isn't like that. It may seem like fun and games, but it's not. This is work. My work. My world. You don't belong here, and you signed a contract with Austin. Austin, of all people."

She swallowed thickly and tried to smile. "He doesn't seem that bad. He was nice enough when we met."

"Yeah, nice enough," he muttered. He stood up suddenly, and she fell onto her back end, squawking in surprise. "We can't talk here. Come on, we'll go back to the hotel, we can go up to my room and finish this conversation."

"Chris why-" She broke off and took a breath, trying again. "Chris, why are you so scared?"

"The hotel."

"I can't," she murmured. "If I leave before Christian comes back, he's going to be worried." He spun around and glared at her as he pulled his shirt over his head, before sitting back down to take his boots off. "Don't give me that look, Chris. I've been working with Christian for the past month to make sure that I'm not going to get hurt out there. I'm supposed to be riding back to the hotel with him, because he wasn't sure if you'd be happy to see me. We're splitting a room."

Chris threw his boot into his bag and started working on the second one, faster and more angrily as he removed his shin pad and then started to unlace. "You're fucking kidding me. You're sharing a room with that jackass?" he asked.

"I'm an adult, Chris. I can make my own decisions. And don't call him that. Christian's been a good friend to me this past month."

He snorted and threw the second boot in the bag, beginning to remove his knee pads. "Yeah, 'cause Austin is paying him to spy for him."

Taking a step back, Lauren gave him an odd look as the knee pads went flying into the bag, one after another, and the second one bounced out, landing on the ground. She reached down and picked it up, the same time that Chris popped up to his feet, pulling a pair of jeans out of his bag and throwing them on the bench. "Could you make any more of a mess?" she complained, as his shin pads and boots tumbled out onto the ground as well. Down on one knee, she started to repack his things before looking up at him. "For fuck's sake, Chris, we may be related, but that doesn't mean that I'm comfortable seeing you naked!" she exclaimed, shutting her eyes.

"Then don't look," came his smart-ass reply. She growled, staying crouched on the ground with his knee pad in one hand, listening as he peeled off his wrestling tights and pulled on his jeans. "You're safe," he told her, watching as she cautiously opened one eye to peek at him. If the situation had been different, he may have laughed at her. But the situation wasn't different, and that was the problem. There was nothing humorous about the situation.

"I don't know why you're bothering to hurry. I'm going to the hotel with Christian," she said again, her voice gaining back some of its strength. "He's my friend."

"He's a fucking sell out and a spy. You'd be better off if you stay away from him. Fuck!" he exploded, picking up the water bottle near him and throwing it at the far wall. She let out an abbreviated scream and jumped back, feeling a spray of room temperature water hit her face and chest.

"What the fuck is your problem?" she screeched at him, wiping the water droplets off of her face.

"You know what my fucking problem is!" he roared back, as the door to the locker room opened and Christian walked in, looking between the two warily. Chris was standing there, his hands balled into fists and shirtless, half dressed, his chest heaving. Lauren was across the room from him, practically panting with her anger, mirroring his stance, though not as red in the face as her brother was.

"Not that either of you watched, I won my match," he said nonchalantly. "And I see you guys decided to try and work through your problems. That's good."

"Get the hell out of here," Chris demanded of the other man, his eyes remaining on his sister.

"Don't talk to him like that," Lauren shouted back.

Christian merely walked between them, over to his bag, as he picked it up and strung it over his shoulder. "I'll be quick with my shower, and then we can go get your stuff from Austin's room and get out of here. Think you can keep from ripping each other's heads off until then?"

Chris finally turned to look at him, contempt written on his face. "She's not going anywhere with you," he scoffed. "She's going back with me."

"Like hell I am. You think I want to go anywhere with you when you're acting so pissy? You're throwing shit around, Christopher. You could have hit me, and you expect me to be alone with you? Go calm down. We can talk in the morning." Chris rolled his eyes and pulled a shirt over his head, before taking a large step across the room, shouldering the other man out of his way, and wrapped his hand around Lauren's wrist again, giving her a tug forward. She cried out and tripped over his bag between them, only Chris's hold on her keeping her from falling down to her knees.

Christian was beside him in an instant, his hand on the other's man's shoulders, and while he kept his tone light, the stoniness in his expression and the strength of the hold showed his true intent. "You want to let go of Lauren, man. She doesn't want to go with you, and I can't blame her."

"I'm sorry, but when the fuck did your last name become Jericho? Because this is a family discussion."

"Well, you're yelling loud enough to involve me, and besides, you're holding her pretty tight." Christian tightened his hand on Jericho's shoulder. "I'm serious, man. Let her go. Now," he said softly. "You're scaring your sister. Hell, you're scaring me."

Glaring at him, Chris let go of his sister's wrist, before shoving his hand through his hair. "This is bullshit," he muttered, turning away.

"Your sister had a good idea. Go back to your room, cool down. One of you is going to do something that you're going to regret. You don't want to do that."

Chris snorted as he picked up his bag and threw it over his shoulder, taking his jacket in hand. "Didn't you hear, man?" He turned to look over his shoulder and met Christian's eyes, rather than his sister's. "She's only my half sister," he said coldly, before slamming his palm against the locker room door, storming out.

"Jackass," Christian muttered, before giving Lauren a look, watching as she rubbed her wrist for the second time that night. "You okay, sweetheart? You're probably going to have a bit of a bruise," he said, as he took her wrist in hand and examined it. "It's swelling a little, too."

"I'll be fine," she said stiffly, withdrawing her hand from him. "No worse than the bruises that I got on my butt when we got into the ring the first few times."

"True enough," he said, a bit of a smile coming to his face. "Want me to go beat him up for you?"

She shook her head and forced a smile on her face. "I want you to go shower so we can get the hell out of here. The sooner this night is over, the better."

"Sure thing." He picked up his bag again, after he had dropped it when he had been pushed by Chris, nodding at a magazine on the bench. "Feel free. If you turn on the monitor, you can see the rest of the show, too. Big main event."

"Thanks," she said, watching as he disappeared into the bathroom, the door shutting quietly behind him. Only when she heard the water of the shower start did she sit down on the bench and drop her head into her hands, cursing herself for what had happened.

And for causing that look on her brother's face.


	3. Chapter Two

**Bound and Chained: Edge of Reason  
Chapter Two**

They had been quiet on the ride back to the hotel, something that Lauren had been happy about. She wasn't in the mood to talk, especially about what had happened in the locker room. She knew that Christian had questions, especially about what had happened to bring them to the state they had been in during his match, but she didn't think she had it in her for another long discussion.

Instead, he had taken her stuff about of the back of the car, refusing to let her carry it herself, and led the way back to the hotel room that they had checked into earlier that day. She shrugged off her jacket when they got into the room and threw it on a nearby chair, going into the bathroom to change into a pair of track pants and a tee shirt to sleep in, before coming back to sink down on the edge of the bed nearest to the door.

"Your wrist hurts, doesn't it?" he asked after awhile, digging into his suitcase for something.

"Why do you think that?"

"I'm not an idiot, Lauren, no matter how I come across on television. It's one thing I like about you, actually. You haven't seen that much of any of us, so you don't have any preconceptions about any of us. Especially me."

She frowned and cocked her head to the side, looking at him oddly. "I already know that you're a smart guy, Christian. Spending five minutes with you, I knew that."

"Yeah, I'm smart. Which is why I know that you're favouring your wrist, and I can see from where that it's not looking too good." He smiled softly, shaking his head. "I'll wrap it up for you. Just try to keep it above your chest, to try and keep the swelling down."

She made a face but stayed where she was, watching as he found what he was looking for, a small canvas bag that from the look of the contents, he had turned into a medical bag. He found an elastic compression bandage and sat down next to her, resting her wrist on his knee as he unwrapped the bandage. "I don't even want to know how much money you're spent on those things over the years," she tried to joke, looking up at him.

His lips twitched as he found the end and lifted her hand. She had such small wrists compared to him, he realized, and figured that he could easily wrap his fingers around it and have them touch. "Usually, I just get them from the trainers. If you ask, they'll usually throw you an extra one so that you can change the original out if it gets dirty. Which, it probably will." He wound the bandage a few times and pulled on the top of it, to see how tightly it was stretched. "Too tight?"

"No, it's fine."

"Just let me know if it is, 'kay? I don't want to cut off your circulation." He continued for a moment in silence, stringing the bandage between her thumb and finger and then around again, making a face when he saw how it was laying against her skin. He undid his work and chuckled at the look on her face. "I can be a bit of a perfectionist," he explained, trying again. This time satisfied, he continued on. "He was pretty mad at you."

She scoffed, keeping her eyes on the bandage as it was slowly wound around her wrist, then unwound and wound again until he found the tension that he wanted. "Chris has always been a bit of a hothead. He's just plain emotional, and he let it get the best of him."

Christian gave her an odd look, before reaching beside him for the metal fasteners, hooking them into the bandage to keep it from opening. Patting her hand, he put it back down on the bed and collected his things, zipping up the medical bag. "You're talking about Chris Jericho, right? He keeps himself pretty controlled. A little too tightly controlled, I think. I can count the times I've seen him blow up on...well, on three fingers. And I've known him for quite awhile."

She shrugged. "Maybe he's different in the locker room, but I lived with him long enough to know his moods. He lets his emotions take him over, and it's not always pretty. Like tonight. It's been a long time since I've seen him snap like that."

"He was pretty close to doing something," Christian said, repacking his things and then sitting down on his own bed, turning to face her. "He seriously looked like he was pushed to the edge. That's something new."

"He was," she answered with another shrug, before tucking her hair behind her ears when it fell in her face. "He wouldn't have hit me or done anything, Christian. No, seriously, don't give me that look. I know Chris. He'd never hurt me, at least not intentionally, and trust me, my wrist wasn't intentional. He didn't realize that he was holding me so tightly."

"Could've fooled me," he muttered, shaking his head. "I was worried for a bit there, Lauren. He seemed like a man possessed."

She sighed and wrapped her arms around herself, and found a sudden surge of energy. Standing up, she began to pace the length of the room, Christian's eyes following her slowly. "He was, but it wasn't just anger. I don't get it. I don't think I've ever seen him...he was scared, Christian. I don't know why, but he was scared of something. Not just me getting hurt or me being here. It's something more than that." She stopped for a moment and looked at him, as if she were expecting an answer.

He simply shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know, sweetheart. I don't pretend to understand what goes through that guy's head."

Nodding sadly, she turned away again and dug into the duffel bag she had taken to the arena with her, finding her wallet. "I'm too amped to go to bed. I think I'm gonna go get something to drink. There are vending machines down the hall, right?" After getting directions from Christian, she left the hotel room, taking her time as she walked down the hallway.

She rounded the corner to where the elevator banks were and continued on, following the signs until she found herself turning a second corner, biting her lip when she saw a familiar figure standing in front of one of the machines. For a moment she froze, knowing that he hadn't seen her yet, and thought that maybe she had enough time to turn around. Spinning on her heel, she took a step forward and cursed when her wallet slipped out of her grasp, landing on the floor.

Chris Jericho turned around and spotted her, his face softening a bit when he saw her. Walking over to her, he bent down and picked up her wallet, handing it over to her. As he did so, he caught sight of the bandage on her wrist. "I'm...did I do that to you?" he asked softly, moving his hand to touch the bandage.

She pulled her hand back and thrust her chin forward. "Did you see anyone else pull me along like a three year old tonight?" she asked stiffly, wishing that she could have just bit her tongue and answered him honestly.

"No, I'm guessing that I was the only one." He met her eyes, and she could feel her anger towards her half-brother crumbling when she saw the look in his eyes. Damn him for having such expressive eyes, she thought to herself, some of the fight leaving her tense body. "I'm sorry, Laurie. I didn't mean to hurt you."

"Well, you did," she mumbled, breaking the eye contact. Instead, she looked at the candy bar in his hand, examining the wrapper.

"I know." He slipped his finger under her chin and brought her face back up, so that their eyes could meet. "And I'm sorry."

She sighed. "I know." She smiled, and there was a slight tremble to her lips that he barely caught. "We really fucked up again, didn't we, Chris? Our family's good at that."

Chris smiled back, and it was just as tentative as hers."Yeah, we have a habit of that. Take after our parents. But you know, maybe it's not so bad. I mean, Dad continually fucked up when we were kids, and he still managed to raise us right."

With a snort, she tossed her head, causing his hand to fall back down against his side. "Yeah, we turned out just fine. We don't see each other for over a year, and we start fighting as soon as we do." The smile came back to her face as she recalled something that their father had said to them many times before. "Fine mess that we're in, big brother," she said, amending the phrase to fit them.

He grinned back. "Yeah." His grin faltered and he shifted on his feet. "So, uh...Christian's treating you all right?" She nodded her head, but didn't say anything. "Good, because you know, if anything happens or if you feel uncomfortable or anything, I'm just down the hall. Or I'll come and get you. Just so you know. If you need an out or something."

"Thanks," she told him, fighting not to chuckle at his rambling. "But Christian and I are fine. He's been good to me. Great, even."

"Good. But I'm here for you. If you need me."

A silence fell between them that was more uncomfortable than was usual for them. They were brother and sister, had grown up in the same house as each other, and were more often than not bickering about one thing or another. Lauren had been the typical little sister, in Chris's eyes, always wanting to tag along and wanting to steal all the attention, giggling at his friends and generally acting like a brat. And to her, Chris had been the typical older brother, gruff and brusque with her, going out and doing things without her and teasing her when she was too young or too little to join in. Half of their lives together had been lived in silence of one type or another. But the aftermath of a fight, during that tentative making up period, that had always been the worst for both of them.

"I should-" she began, jerking her thumb over her shoulder, only to be interrupted by Chris.

"We should talk," he said quietly, and then forced a laugh. "I didn't mean to interrupt you. And I don't mean that we should talk now. Maybe in a bit. You know, when we both get a little more comfortable about the idea of you being here."

"Sure. That sounds good." They were quiet again, until she sighed. "Chris, what did you mean earlier? When you called Christian a spy and a sell-out, I mean. What were you talking about?"

His eyes became cold again and he stepped back, the wrapped of his candy bar crinkling in his hand. "It's not as much of an insult as you think, Lauren, so don't get your duff up, protecting your new best friend. I'm just as much a sell-out as he is. The only difference is that I admit it," he said bitterly

Shaking her head, Lauren felt the laughter bubbling inside of her. "Chris, you're not a sell-out. You're anything _but_ a sell-out. I know how hard you're worked to get here. The idea that you're a sell-out is ridiculous. It's...it's..." She trailed off, unsure of how to continue.

"Laughable?" he asked, shaking his head slightly. "You don't understand, Lauren. You haven't been around for the past year. You don't know what I've done. Not what you see on television or what you read on the Internet. You don't know what I've done to bring myself to this point."

She stepped forward, reaching for his arm, but Chris stepped back, refusing to look at her. "Then make me understand. Tell me. I'm here for awhile. We can finally catch up. Tell me what you've been up to."

"Forget it, Lauren," he said, before pushing past her and walking away. He knew that she was standing in the alcove, watching him leave, and as much as he wanted to look over his shoulder, he refused to. Instead, he let himself into his room and shut the door, being sure to flip the deadbolt. His cell phone, sitting on his bed, caught his attention with it incessant flashing that he had messages.

With a sigh, Chris moved over to his bed and scooped up the phone, dropping the candy bar down on his bed. The display on the cell phone listed the same number three times, and he swore as he dialled it back, not bothering to check his messages.

"You've got me," a male voice said.

"It's me," Chris answered, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "She's my sister, before you ask."

The voice on the other end was quiet for a moment, the sound of papers shuffling in the background. "Your sister. Laura or whoever. Did you know she was coming?"

"Lauren, and no. I would have told you if I did. Man, she signed a year long contract with Austin. Fucking Austin of all people!" he exclaimed, shoving a hand through his loose hair.

A sigh met his ears. "Well, that explains why she was on the ramp next to him. This changes everything, Jericho. Do you understand that? Everything."

"It's not her fault," he ground out, his fingers getting caught on a tangle in his hair. When he removed his hand and looked at the mirror on the wall, he realized that he looked like a man possessed, all wild hair and eyes, flushed with anger once again. "She doesn't realize what she's walking into. I don't know what the hell he said to her, but whatever it was, she fell for it. And now she's here. She's staying with Christian."

The other voice gave a startled laugh that turned into a cough. "Sorry, Jericho, it's just...the fact that your sister is staying with him...this is really screwed up." They were both quiet for a moment. "I don't know what you want to do, man. I mean, your hands are kinda tied in one way, but what are you going to do about your sister?"

"I don't know yet. But I can't let her stay. He'll destroy her. She's not like me," he added softly. "She's nothing like me. She shouldn't be here."

"But she is. And this is a problem that you're going to have to deal with. There's not much I can do without compromising everything that we've done recently."

Chris rolled his eyes, and gave himself another look in the mirror, not liking his reflection. "I know."

Their conversation finished soon after that, and he dropped the phone beside him, falling down on the bed to stare at the ceiling, his mind racing.

* * *

Lauren let herself back into the room, pushing the hotel door room shut, before remembering that she was staying with someone and closing it softly instead, sighing as she came into the room. She was about to say something about the lack of a drink her hand, and the words died before they could make it out of her throat.

She had been gone longer than she had anticipated, because Christian was already asleep in the far bed, turned on his side with his back facing her, snoring lightly. He had left the lamp closest to the door on for her and had pulled the second pillow over his head to block out the light. She faltered for a moment, unsure of what to do. When she had come into the room, she had been so certain that he was still going to be awake, and that he would be willing to sit down with her and let her vent out her frustrations and maybe, just maybe, ask him about what Chris had called him.

Biting her lip, she turned and walked into the bathroom, closing the door behind her and going over to the far wall, sliding down it until she was sitting on the floor. Finally, the tears came that she had been expecting. They were hot and stung her eyes, and she pressed the heels of her hands against them, not wanting to disrupt their flow, but wanting to stop the damned pain. Her head fell down onto her upraised knees, her forehead pressing against them hard enough that she was sure the fabric was going to be imprinted against her skin.

She wasn't sure how long she had been in there before she began to sob, but her face had been slick with her tears and her nose plugged up to the point she wasn't sure she'd ever be able to breathe out of it again. Not wanting to wake up Christian in the main room, she bit down on the material of her jeans, trying to muffle the sounds that were trying to escape her, turning the moans and wails into pitiful whimpers, hating herself for sitting in the bathroom crying but knowing that she needed it at the same time.

Her brother was infuriating, completely frustrating. The way that he could switch from one emotion to another had always amazed me, but it seemed during the short time they had spent with each other that night, he always ended with contempt and anger. She didn't know who those were being directed to, but they scared her, and her natural response to fear was to fight back. She had been purposely goading him into fighting with her, and she couldn't help it. Oh, she could try and play innocent, pretend like she didn't know what she was doing, but she damned well did know, and it was disgusting. What the hell had happened to the young woman that just wanted to make sure her brother was all right, that he was surviving, that he was fine?

Maybe being there was a mistake. Maybe signing that contract had been the right thing to do. Steve Austin had seemed like a decent man to her, infatuated with his profession and fiercely protective of it, but then she had seen the same characteristics in her brother and in Christian. Maybe she could reason with him, see if he'd let her break the contract, pretend like she had never been there. The last talk with Chris had made it pretty clear to her: he didn't want her there. He didn't want her anywhere near him. _Go home_, he had kept telling her, whether verbally or with his body language. _Go back to Vancouver, go back to Winnipeg, go anywhere but get the hell away from me_.

While she had been lost in her thoughts, she had let her tears, her own emotions, get away from her, and she cut herself off when she realized that she was sobbing aloud, the sound echoing in the bathroom. She moved her hands down to her mouth from her eyes and pressed hard with her one good hand, as if she could keep the sound in. But once it escaped, she knew there was no going back. Instead, she tried to keep quiet, keep it under control, but wanting nothing more than to scream out her pain and frustration.

The door to the bathroom opened, and she refused to look up, even when she heard the sigh from the man standing in front of her. "Come on, sweetheart," he said, crouching down beside her. Christian put his arm around her and helped her back to her feet, pressing her against his side. He winced as he stood up, and kept Lauren with him, rubbing her arm as he guided her from the bathroom to her bed.

Blindly, she followed his unspoken instructions, sitting down on the bed and feeling it dip beside her as he sat down as well, drawing his other arm around her. Throughout the past month, she had gotten used to physical contact with Christian, but this was something new. This wasn't throwing her around the ring, or teaching her how to counter wrestling grapples and attacks. At the same time, she didn't care. She _needed_ to cry, damn it. And both of them knew that.

He sighed again. "You ran into him in the hall, I'm guessing. I should have gone with you." She gulped air into her mouth and let it out in a soft wail, shaking her head against him. "It's all right, Lauren."

She wanted to scream that it wasn't all right, that her big brother was pushing her away. That no matter what they had gone through, no matter everything her family had been through, he was her rock, he had been the one that she looked to for strength and comfort, and he didn't want her around. But all she could do was cry harder against Christian's bare shoulder, clutching at him like she was drowning in a raging ocean and he was her lifeline. She hated and loved her brother, and she felt like she was being torn up inside.

So they sat there, side by side, one comforting the other, one trying to cry out all of her pain.


	4. Chapter Three

**Bound and Chained: Edge of Reason  
Chapter Three**

Christian let himself back into the hotel room, balancing the to-go cups of coffee atop each other as he pushed the door open with his hip. He stepped in and let it close behind him at the same time that Lauren walked out of the bathroom, rubbing her hair with a towel. "Hey, you're up," he said with a smile.

"Yeah, just after you left. Is that coffee?" He passed over the top cup to her, watching as she opened the lid and breathed deeply, a smile coming to her face. "You're the best, Christian."

His smile widened just a little as he walked over to his bed, sitting down on the edge. "So, uh, we have a two hour drive ahead of us to get to the Smackdown taping tonight. You just about ready?"

She nodded. "Uh huh. I packed up my stuff. I, um, threw your stuff in your travel bag, too. You know, your book and whatnot." She looked at him apprehensively, and then relaxed when she saw the easygoing smile on his face.

"Cool, thanks. I always end up having to do a last minute rush for my stuff." He sipped his coffee and watched as she did the same, before continuing to towel off her hair. "So, uh, about last night," he began, looking up at her from between his eyelashes. He saw the way she froze with the towel in her hands, looking like a deer caught in the headlights. He relented, deciding to give her a little space. "Did you sleep all right? I know that hotel rooms can get kind of hard to get used to."

Glaring at him, she stalked past to the bathroom and threw the towel into the bottom of the drying tub, before coming back to dig her hair brush out of her duffel bag. "Do you have a match tonight?" she asked him instead, her body and voice equally stiff.

Christian opened his mouth to say something, decided against it, and then tried again. "Yeah. Actually, Chris and I have a match together." Her head turned toward him sharply, and he chuckled. "We're not fighting each other, we're teaming up. It's gonna be us against Chris Benoit and...and Edge."

"Your brother, Edge," she said, finishing with her brush and putting it away. She saw his nod out of the corner of her eye and grabbed her coffee, sitting on the opposite bed. "Is it- I mean, do you- Is it hard fighting him? I kind of have an idea of what went on, but not really."

He chuckled bitterly, drinking more of his coffee before answering her. She recognized the gesture for what it was, him having to sort through his thoughts and edit them so that she could understand. "Judging from last night, you probably have some idea of how I feel. It's not easy. I don't think it'll ever be easy. We're family, and we're beating the crap out of each other, rather than talking about anything. 'Least you and Jerky haven't gotten to that point yet."

"You say _yet_ as if it's going to happen," she said sadly. "Do you really think that?"

Shrugging his shoulders, Christian stood up. "I honestly don't know. Maybe you and Chris will be different. But if there's one thing that I've learned about the WWF after being a fan for years, and then working here, it's the fact that family doesn't mean a damned thing. Not after awhile. You can grow up with someone, live with them, fight with them side by side, but eventually, it doesn't mean anything anymore."

If they had known each other longer, she may have jumped up and given him a hug. And part of her felt horrible that she didn't, because he had put his arms around her and comforted her last night, but she couldn't. The broken look that he wore prevented her, like it was a virus that she could catch. "Chris and I aren't going to be like that," she murmured, reverent in her belief.

He broke out of his reverie. Turning to her, he forced a smile on his face. "I certainly hope not. No one else needs to get hurt like that in this company. There's already enough bodies on the side of the road. No need to add anymore to it." Shaking his head, he transferred his coffee cup from one hand to the other and picked up his duffel bag, stringing it over his shoulder. "C'mon, let's get checked out and on the road. The sooner we get to the next town, the sooner we can get this night over with."

"Sure," she said softly, following his lead and grabbing her own gear, Christian leading his way to the door. He held it open and let her pass through before closing it behind him. "Are we sure we have everything?"

He shrugged. "I didn't see anything left behind. You?" She shook her head and followed him to the elevator, her eyes on the suitcase rolling in front of her. "You going to come down to the ring with me and Chris tonight? Make your actual debut? Because honestly, last night didn't count. You didn't even get to do anything, but stand there and let your brother pull you away."

"It's up to Mr. Austin, I guess," she said as they walked into the elevator. She reached forward and pressed the button for the lobby, catching a glimpse of his smirk in the reflective doors as they closed. "I know, he doesn't look like much of a _Mr. _Austin, but until he tells me otherwise, I'm going the polite route. He's my boss. I don't really want to screw up with him. But I doubt that Chris wants me to come, anyway. He doesn't want me here, why the hell would he want me outside the ring during his match?"

"Ringside," he corrected, before shaking his head. "Well, I want you out there. Doesn't that count for something? I mean, we put in all of this work so that you _could_ be out there, we might as well use it."

Lowering her head, she smiled to the floor, looking up under her hair to watch the numbers on the elevator's display change. "I also don't want you and Chris to fight. You guys are friends. You don't need the little sister causing any problems."

He grinned down at her. "Go ahead and cause problems. Might liven the place up a bit. 'Sides, Jericho and I aren't exactly buddy-buddy anymore. To tell you the truth, he's not really buddy-buddy with anyone anymore."

"He was before, wasn't he?" she asked as they reached the ground floor. They pulled their suitcases out with him, trudging over to the front desk.

Christian raised a finger and then motioned for her key. "Hold that thought, I'll go check us out." She sighed and sat down on her suitcase, kicking at the carpet in front of her like a petulant child. Every time she asked someone a question, whether it was him or Chris or her new boss, they all gave her the run-around, or disappeared and forgot to answer afterwards. She frowned and watched as Christian took the receipt from the desk clerk and stuffed it into the side of his duffel bag, before rejoining her. "So, where we were?"

"Discussing my brother and his lack of friends," she answered promptly.

"Ah, right." He pushed the front door open for her and waited for her to pass before directing her to where they had parked the car the night before. "I don't know. A lot of things have changed. Jericho used to hang out with a big group of people, you know? About a year ago, he just started alienating people, pushing them away. I can't say I really noticed. I was doing the same thing, and Chris and I just fell into rooming together and sharing a locker room, because no one else could stand to be around us." He flashed her a half-grin. "Don't worry, you'll run away screaming from me yet."

"Oh, I have no doubt," she answered sweetly, grinning when he gently swatted her arm. "It can't be fun for you guys back there."

As he was unlocking the trunk, he turned to look at her, a bit of a smile on his face. "You're not going to make it in this business with an attitude like that. Or last the year that you signed on for. We're doing what we love to do. Sure, it's not always fun. Sometimes it sucks. That's how any job is. Besides, at the end of the week, when all is said and done, there's always your - " He broke off, an odd look on his face.

"Family?" she asked, before shaking her head. "We're a fine pair, Christian. We both have older brothers that don't want us around."

He shrugged and started loading the back of the car, stuffing their duffel bags into available corners in order to close the trunk. The loud bang made her jump and he shot her an apologetic look before unlocking the passenger side door for her. "Yeah, well...you and I could always be the charter members of the Annoying Younger Siblings club."

"You get to be president," she said with a grin as she slid into the passenger seat. "I'll be secretary. I'm probably better at paperwork than you anyway."

He closed the door on her with a smirk.

* * *

The edict had come down from Steve Austin: whether or not Chris liked it, Lauren would be walking out with him and Christian for their tag team match that night. When Christian had walked into the locker room to share the news, Chris had stood up and sworn before storming out, leaving his sister to smile sadly after him.

Christian had played it off like nothing had happened, and stayed with her during the long wait before the television taping began, nudging her after a check of the clock to warn her that she had best get ready to go out there. She took her bag into the connecting bathroom with her and had changed her top and shoes, deciding on a plain coloured tank top as opposed to the old Manitoba Moose tee shirt she had worn to the arena. Coming out of the bathroom with her hair fixed into a ponytail, she caught sight of her brother coming back into the room.

Chris looked towards her, shaking his head. "That's what you're wearing?" he asked.

"Sorry. Only one person in the family can pull off the sequin addiction," she tossed back, pushing her bag back under the bench.

Christian gave her a grin as he went to change into his ring attire, chuckling the entire time. "Play nice now, children." The door shut before he noticed Chris flipping him off.

"Be nice," she admonished her brother, gasping in surprise when he turned to her suddenly and grabbed her shoulders.

"If you think, at any time, you're going to be in trouble, you run the hell up that ramp and get back to this room, you understand me?" he asked in a hiss. "You lock this door and don't open it until you hear me."

She shook her head. "What are you- "

"Shut up and listen to me for once, Laurie. I don't want you getting hurt out there. You think someone is coming to hit you or grab you, you run. And when I'm in the ring, I don't want you standing near Christian. You move away from him, you understand me?" Chris continued in a low voice. His eyes were gleaming with some sort of emotion, but for the life of her, for the first time in years, she couldn't identify it. "And whatever you do, whatever Austin tells you, don't get involved in the match. He told you too, didn't he?"

She nodded slowly, and swallowed. "Yeah. He said that if Edge goes for a spear or Benoit goes for a flying head butt, I should grab their ankle and pull hard. He even showed me a tape, so I'd know what it looked like. But isn't that what a valet does? I mean, Christian and I were working in the ring so that I could- "

"Yeah, you were working in the ring, and you knew what was going to happen. He fucking told you what he was going to do before he did it, didn't he?" At her nod, he swore. "Exactly. You're not going to know what they're going to do. If they do anything. And they probably won't, unless you get involved. Don't do it. Just stay away from them, all right? Please, Laurie, I don't want you getting hurt out there."

There was a long moment of silence between them, where brother and sister looked each other in the eyes, before she relented. "Okay," she whispered.

"Okay?"

"Okay." When the word was repeated, he sighed and let go of her shoulders, wrapping his arms around her for a moment.

"Good. You had me worried that for a second," he told her, and he sounded like the old Chris, with a tone of voice that suggested that a laugh was only a second away. "Look, we have a house show to do after this, and then we're off for three days. Two and a half, if you count traveling. We're closer to your place than mine. Do you want to hang out?"

She stepped away from him and sighed. "No, I want to talk. But yeah, if you want to come back home for awhile, it would be cool."

He cocked an eyebrow at her and spun his finger around, silently telling her to turn around so that he could get changed into his ring gear. She did so, rolling her eyes and wondering why he couldn't just wait for the bathroom to be free, like Christian had. "Vancouver is not home. Winnipeg is home."

"It's still Canada. Just...west coast. Little less snow, little more rain."

"Little more? Last time I was out there, I was surprised that we didn't get flooded out," he complained good naturedly. "You got a bed for the spare room yet?"

"Nope. You'll be stuck with the pull-out couch in the living room. But hey, you get my crappy television with no cable. I think I pick up three or four channels." Chris laughed from behind her, and she felt herself smile, feeling the tension leave her body for awhile. This was the old Chris, the Chris that she had known for the past few years, the one that she liked. It was a hell of a lot better than seeing the angry, ugly side.

They bantered for a few minutes more, before Chris had finished changing and Christian had come back into the room, quiet and taking in the suddenly cheerful atmosphere, as Lauren spun around to look at her brother, wrinkling her nose. "_That's_ what you're wearing?" she asked, mimicking his earlier question to her.

Chris looked himself up and down, before readjusting his shirt, tugging on the lapels with a smirk. "Hey, only one person in the family can pull off the sequined look. I got all the good looks in the family."

"Uh huh, sure."

* * *

"What the _fuck_ was that?"

The question had started off low in tone and had risen considerably by the end. She knew what Austin was asking her about, and could only stand there, looking down at the ground. To say that he wasn't happy with her would have been an understatement.

It had been a toss-up for her, the decision weighing heavily on her mind as she had gone to the ring between her brother and Christian. They had even announced her name on the way down, shocking her into looking up rather than down at the ramp as they had been walking. Before taking her place outside the ring, her brother had given her a look, one that clearly showed that he was expecting her to listen to his earlier demand and not interfere in the match, like she had been asked to.

And she hadn't. She was fooling herself if she thought she belonged out there, she realized. What she saw on television was nothing like what she had seen in front of her eyes. She could hear every groan, every grunt, every heavy breath, every smack of flesh against flesh. If not in her current situation, she probably would have joked with her Chris afterwards that it sounded more like a pornographic movie than a wrestling match, but instead she had just stood there, her hands clasped behind her back and taking in the match with wide eyes.

There had been a few opportunities that she could have grabbed at either Edge or Benoit when they came near the corner. Edge had done his spear on her brother, and for the life of her, she just couldn't move when he had crouched down in the corner. He had shot her a wary look to begin with, but she didn't so much as twitch a muscle, didn't even look at him. That wasn't her world and she didn't feel like she belonged. Benoit's flying head butt had occurred on the other side of the ring, and it had been interrupted by Christian before he could hit it, which she was thankful for. One screw-up was bad enough. No, she had just stood there, silent and unmoving, almost like she was a mannequin, until the end of the match, when she walked back with her brother and his tag team partner.

"They won the match," she said quietly to the carpet, afraid to look her new boss in the eye.

His hand slammed down on a nearby surface and she jumped at the sound, biting her bottom lip. "I didn't care who won the damned match," Austin roared. "I told you to get your ass involved in the match. Did you?"

"I thought...they were winning. I didn't think- "

"_They were winning_. I told you that didn't matter," he explained again, mocking her. She wrapped her arms around herself, hearing the leather jacket she was wearing creak. "It doesn't matter what happens during the match. What matters is at the end, and whose hand is being raised after the bell. And you can't even follow a single fucking instruction. Did I see you grab Edge when he went for the spear? Did I see you go towards Benoit when he went for the head butt?"

"I...no. But Benoit was on the other side and I didn't think I would be able to get there in time," she lied quietly, blinking her eyes when she felt the sting of tears.

"Then you hustle your ass over there. What part of _interfere_ are you not understanding?"

"They won the match," she said again softly, knowing that she sounded like a broken record, but unable to mount any sort of defence. The man was intimidating enough of his own, but when he was shouting and carrying on like he was, she was scared. And she didn't think that he wanted to hear about how her brother had asked her not to interfere in the match. Lauren was sure that Austin wouldn't take it well, that she had listened to her own brother over her boss.

Austin stalked closer to her, standing only inches away from her. His breath was sour against her face and she fought not to twist her lips in disgust. "Look at me." When she didn't raise her head, he raised his voice. "I said, _look at me_." She brought her face up, her chin trembling as she met his angry eyes. "You will _never_ disrespect me like that again. You _will_ do what I ask. I am your employer, you are my employee. Remember that talk we had about your contract, and how it said that _I_ control your career? You will listen to me next time, or so help me God, you will face the consequences. Are we understood?"

She nodded her head quickly. "Yes, sir. I'm sorry, I didn't- "

"I don't want to hear your fucking excuses!" he shouted back in her face. "Now get out of here. And next week...next week, we better not have a problem like this. Now go!" He pointed a finger at the door behind her, and she nodded jerkily again, stepping back from him before disappearing through the door, a hand covering her mouth.

She hurried down the hall of the arena blindly, not even trying to find the locker room she was sharing with Chris and Christian. She just knew that she had to get the hell away from the irate man in the other room, and as quickly as possible.


	5. Chapter Four

**Bound and Chained: Edge of Reason  
Chapter Four**

It was the night before they had to go back on the road that they finally talked.

That wasn't to say that Chris and Lauren hadn't talked the day before at her small apartment in Vancouver, just that they hadn't talked about the subject they were forever tap dancing around. They had spent the day together, utilizing the laundry facilities in the building and sprawled out in the living room watching television, usually flipping between a news channel and a sports channel. Chris had taken her car and followed her directions to the nearest gym, complaining about the condition of the little Volkswagen when he returned. She had cooked, and hidden the soup can from view so he wouldn't complain about the sodium and fat content of the sauce she made for the chicken.

It was almost like it had been two years ago, Chris coming to visit after a long trip, usually only swinging up to her place if the WWF had been doing a tour through Canada, or somewhere on the west coast of the United States. And even though they were acting like the old Chris and Lauren, there was a shadow that loomed over every conversation they had. One that neither of them particularly wanted to shed any light on.

Chris stretched on the couch, his eyes still glued to the replay of a baseball game. "What time is it?" he asked, before he yawned, cracking his jaw in the process. He rubbed it with a frown on his face.

Looking up from the newspaper spread on her lap, Lauren checked the clock beside her. "Seven. We should probably think about going to bed soon. Our flight leaves at five thirty, and we'll need to be there an hour beforehand."

He finally looked at her, having to crane his neck up from where he was sprawled on the couch, his legs outstretched to the coffee table and almost falling off the edge. "I know, Laurie. I'm the seasoned traveler here."

"You're also trying to polish my table with your jeans, Christopher," she said drily, reaching out blindly to smack his arm. He groaned and pushed himself back up, flashing her a look. "You made me miss that double."

She hit his arm again. "You already got the final score on the news. Hell, we saw the play on the news."

"I'm gonna start yelling about brother abuse if you don't stop it," he warned her.

"Ha ha," she said flatly, before folding up the paper and throwing it on the table beside her. "So, we've got...oh, an hour and a half before we go to bed. Are we going to talk or are we going to use the classic Jericho tactic of ignoring the subject and hoping it goes away on its own?"

He raised an eyebrow, still watching the game. "You mean that closing your eyes and saying 'it isn't real' over and over doesn't work anymore?"

"Not since I was six."

"Tried pulling the covers over your head?" he asked innocently.

"Chris," she groaned. "You're the one that wanted to talk. All week, you've been all 'we need to talk' and then when we plan to talk, you act like you're all put out by it."

He turned to look at her, the light from the television reflecting off of his eyeglasses, before sighing. "I know. It's just...this isn't exactly an easy conversation. There's a lot that you don't know, and a lot that you probably won't understand."

She pursed her lips and looked away for a moment. "And whose fault is that?" she asked, before looking out of the corner of her eye at him.

"Nu uh. You're not goading me into fighting. You want to talk, we'll talk, but we're definitely not going to get into a fight. That's all we do."

"That's all we did growing up," she countered, offering him a bit of a smile.

Chris, on the other hand, shot back with one of his bright grins, the likes of which hadn't been seen on television for the past while. "Yeah, well, I had the most annoying sister in the world. What did you expect? You were always bugging me when I was trying to study, or when I was hanging out with my friends."

"Avoiding the subject," she pointed out.

He made a face and reached for the television remote, pressing the mute button before tossing it back on the couch. "All right, what do you want to know? I know I'm going to regret this, but- "

She was quick to interrupt him, curling her feet under her as she did so. "Why don't you want me with you in the WWF?" she asked quickly, before smirking. "Sorry, didn't mean to jump the gun before you could get the question out."

He pushed his eyeglasses up and rubbed his eyes while trying to come up with an answer for her. There was a lot that he wanted to say to her, he just didn't quite know how to edit it so that she could understand. "It's not that I don't want you there," he began slowly. "I just never thought that you _would_ be there. Come on, Laurie, admit it. It's not your world. You belong in school, and then you belong in business suits, trying to figure out how you can pad your billing hours with your clients. You're not...it's just not the right place for you."

She shrugged. "Why? What makes it not right for me?"

Readjusting his glasses, he blew out his breath noisily, not particularly sighing, but not incredibly comfortable with the conversation as it was. "It's a tough business. Especially for women. And it doesn't help that you didn't work your way up here. You essentially just got a contract handed to you, no experience, no nothing. You realize that there are going to be a lot of people back there that aren't going to like you for that. Not to mention, having me as a brother, or hanging around Christian as much as you do. We're not exactly the two most loved people there."

"So I've noticed," she murmured. "Why is that?"

"It's complicated." He turned his eyes towards her ceiling, examining the water mark in the corner. He distracted himself for a moment, wondering if the leak in the roof had been fixed, before turning his attention back to her. His eyes, however, never wavered from the brown mark. "I'm an egotistical ass, you know that."

She frowned and shook her head. "Last time I recall having this conversation, I called you an egotistical ass and you told me that it was confidence, not ego. What changed?"

"Gold," he said plainly, before looking over at her. "What's the most important thing in the business? Gold. The one thing everyone fights for, and if you want it bad enough, you're willing to go through anyone to get it. Even friends." His shoulders moved in a lazy shrug. "I've had my eye on the belt for awhile. I have since I came into the WWF. Hell, I had my eye on it back in WCW. There's the rare person backstage that's in this business because they just like to wrestle. But most of us have egos that need to be fed. Mine just happens to be bigger than most."

She pressed a hand to her chest and widened her eyes, giving him a look of shock. "Is it true? Is Christopher Keith Jericho finally admitting that he's driven by his ego? Be still, my heart," she said, her voice practically dripping with sarcasm.

He simply rolled his eyes towards her and raised an eyebrow. "You know, there's an unwritten law that says only the older sibling can pull out the full name." He smiled when she picked up a throw pillow and hit him in the chest with it, grabbing it out of her hands and playing with it for a moment. "Nah, I'm just trying to tell you what it's like. You know me, probably better than most."

"Wish I didn't sometimes," she muttered, before cracking a smile. "It was absolute hell, you know. All my friends were madly in love with you. I never could understand. I mean, you were such a skinny jerk- "

"Skinny? I'm not skinny. If anyone is close to skin and bones, it's you," he accused, throwing the pillow back at her.

She plucked it out of the air and tucked it behind her back primly. "No, now you're getting a gut. But we're getting off the subject. You wanted to be the champion. And then...?"

He barked out a laugh, and shook his head. "And then I fell into the wrong crowd. It sounds like one of those after school specials. My original WWF contract was coming to its end, and I was about to start negotiations with the company when someone else came in with a better offer."

"Steve Austin?" she asked, although she knew the answer before he nodded his head. Lauren shrugged. "He has a bit of a temper, but other than that, he seems all right. I mean, he offered me the contract to be in the WWF, so he can't be that bad, right?" She fought off the shudder at the memory of the night that he had yelled about her lack of involvement in the match, and although she had been frightened, she couldn't help but understand: she was his employee, and he had asked her to do something, which she hadn't followed up on. Any boss, in their right mind, would be upset about that. "Come on, Chris. We were doing so well here, with the talking and the discussing."

"Yeah, well, what he acts like and what he's really like are two completely different things." His look turned shrewd, and she could see herself reflected back in his eyeglasses, superimposed over his intense eyes. "Remember that, Laurie; he's not what he appears to be. You'd be better off if you limit your contact with him to a bare minimum. Same goes for Christian."

She rolled her eyes. "He's your boss, right? Like he's my boss?" At his nod, she laughed and shook her head. "Chris, you're not supposed to like your boss. Nobody likes their boss. In fact, usually, people hate their bosses. You're not that unique."

Rather than cracking a joke like he normally would have, he just sighed and leaned back on the couch. "I told you that you wouldn't understand. You don't have a good understanding of this business. It's not all bright lights and television cameras in your face."

"No shit," she said, giving him an odd look. "In case you don't remember, I saw what it was like when you'd come home on your days off. I've seen you with broken bones, sprains, concussions, stitches, bandages, slings- "

"It's not just the injuries, Lauren. It's the politics that you don't understand," he told her, a crooked smile on his face. "Sometimes I think the politics are more important than the actual wrestling. You're never going to get far without playing the politics game. And I played it, just the wrong way. I thought I was dealing with a president, but he ended up being a dictator."

She rolled her eyes. "Cue the Hitler reference."

"Do you want to hear this or not?" he snapped back at her, his tone harsh.

"Yeah," she mumbled. "It's just...I don't know what you're getting at, Chris. Okay, you don't like Austin. I don't particularly like him, either, but I don't particularly dislike him," she lied, thinking again of the angry man with the red face and the booming voice that had yelled at her.

Chris closed his eyes and tilted his head back, pushing a hand through his hair. The baseball game replay was long forgotten by him as he fought to regain his composure. If there was one thing about his sister that he never understood, it was her lack of attention to anything that didn't involve her. If they were talking about her, about her recent adventures in school and life, taking about her interests, she was the most animated conversationalist he had ever seen. But change the subject from her to someone else, like him, and she could stick with the conversation only so long before she'd drift away. It wasn't that she was particularly self-centered, but a healthy dose of ego was one thing they had been raised to believe in. And they both had copious amounts of it.

The only problem was that his ego had gotten him into trouble, and her ego had done the same. He felt anger welling in him as he realized that she hadn't come to the WWF to see if she could reconnect with her brother. She had shown up, at his company, his place of work, in order to play a role. The perfect sister to the imperfect brother. He had pushed her away, she would bring him back into the fold, and when she returned back to her friends and colleagues in school, she would have thrilling stories of just how _good_ of a person she was.

Chris fought back against the groan he could feel building in his chest, unable to believe that he had actually not seen Lauren's plan before. Oh, yeah, he knew exactly what was going to happen. She would be sitting with her friends, telling them with wide eyes how she had tended to wounds, talked sense into her wayward older brother, stood by his side during one of the lowest points in his life...fuck, but she could be transparent sometimes, he thought angrily to himself.

And even though his thoughts were angry, his face was schooled into contemplation, his body language not giving anything away. So much for her being able to perfectly read him, he thought, his lips twitching in a smirk. He had learned a few tricks over the past year and a half.

That didn't change the fact that she was still there, that she was pulled into this nightmare that he had helped create. Bitch that she could be, hidden agendas that she could have, that was still his little sister that was thrown into what he unjokingly called hell.

A finger poked his upper arm. "Did you fall asleep on me?" Lauren asked.

He opened his blue eyes and looked over at her, giving her a quick smile that she returned. For a moment, he was thankful that Lauren hadn't become an employee of the WWF before. Knowing how dirty she could play, how involved she could be in herself, he could easily see her becoming a noted figure, a terrorizing figure, in the company. If there was one saving grace for him, it was that she was never going to get the chance.

Chris saw that she was still expecting an answer, and shook his head, letting his eye slip shut again. "Just thinking," he murmured, jumping when he felt something small land on his chest and slip down to the couch. He reached down and looked at the penny lying on his hand. "Cute."

"I know," she said, a teasing grin lighting up her face. "They can't be worth much more than that. And it's American."

"There's no exchange rate on coins, genius," he said, before resting the copper coin on his forefinger. He flicked his thumb under it and sent it flipping end over end in the air back to her. Lauren caught it in the palm of her hand and dropped it on the end table.

"I learned very quickly that the States laugh if you give them a coin with the Queen on it. Apparently, they don't spend the same way out there, not like the American coins do out here."

He stopped himself before he got caught into a debate on Canadian politics with her, giving her a fond look instead. "You always keep things interesting," he told her, watching her eyes light up with the compliment. "And you keep your very tired brother from sleeping."

"Yeah, well, my brother's a dork," she said in response, before pushing herself up off the couch. She disappeared into the kitchen, hidden from his view. He heard her running water in the sink, and then in the coffee pot, setting it for the next morning. He finally let out the groan he wanted to earlier and stood up as well, pulling the coffee table across the room before tackling the couch, pushing the futon into place until it resembled a bed. "Did you know I can do hospital corners?" he called to her, picking up the bedding from the armchair and beginning to spread the bottom sheet on the bed.

A slow clap and a laugh met his ears from the kitchen as she finished setting the coffee maker. "Quarter to four good for you?"

"That's fine. We're taking a cab?"

"Yeah." She popped back around the corner and watched as he finished spreading the comforter, throwing the pillows into place. "Those aren't hospital corners, you ass."

He grinned cheekily over his shoulder. "I said I could do 'em, not that I was going to." He straightened up and looked back at the uncomfortable futon, making a face. "Are you sure you want to sleep there?"

"You're the big, bad professional wrestler with the sore back and sore...everything. I'm just the charming and sweet sister," she told him, leaning against the wall with a grin that matched his. "Seriously, Chris, we do this every night you stay here. You take my nice, warm, fluffy bed and I'll take the hard, uncomfortable couch."

Would her friends murmur sympathetically and tell her how nice of a sister she was, he wondered. Maybe their relationship was more fucked up than he had originally thought. Since when had he put that much thought into it. Since when did he care. What had happened to Chris and Lauren, the constantly fighting and occasionally loving Jericho kids, and turned into what they were today: two self-involved, unhappy people. And he knew that she was unhappy. There was no way that she could be happy with the life she had.

Taking her by surprise, he took a step towards her and opened his arms, stunning her for a moment before she fell into them, wrapping her own arms around his waist. They stood there for a moment, both of their eyes closed, both of them quiet, the sounds of traffic coming in through the windows. He held her tightly and thought back to some of the other embraces they had shared, fewer and farther between as they both got older: times when she skinned her knees as a kid, on his eighteenth birthday, his mother's funeral, her graduation from high school, her acceptance to the law program at the University of British Columbia, and the other night in the locker room. Maybe a total of fifteen times, he figured.

"Chris?" she asked softly.

He tightened his hold for a moment and then pulled back, putting a kiss on her forehead. "I miss you, Laurie." _Miss_, he had said, not _missed_. There was a definite distinction to him.

"I'm right here," she said, confused.

He pulled away and gave her that small smile that was showing up more and more often than the bright shit-eating grin that she had known growing up. "Yeah. I'm tired. I'll see you in the morning. Don't forget to turn the mute off the television."

"Sure. Good night." She was still bewildered as she watched him disappear down the hallway and shut the door to her room behind him. Something was going on with her big brother, she just didn't know what.


	6. Chapter Five

**Bound and Chained: Edge of Reason  
Chapter Five**

"Christian!" Lauren exclaimed as she came into the room, letting the door swing shut behind her. She looked around the room, and then flashed a bright smile at the man stretched out along three metal folding chairs, a book in his hands. "Wow, this one is even smaller than the last."

He shrugged his shoulders and smiled up at her, before looking back at his book. "Considering the last locker room was more like a broom closet, that's saying something," he said mildly. "Top talent gets the big rooms. Little guys get the little ones."

"Politics," she muttered, remembering the conversation she had with her brother the night before. "So, how was your time off?" she asked, going to drop her bag and stow it safely under the bench. She had grown up with an older brother who had degenerating eyesight, as she had explained to Christian the first time he had asked her about it, and had quickly learned that while it was amusing to see Chris trip over everything in his way because he couldn't see it, the resulting smacks and shouts weren't.

"Time off," he said, a corner of his mouth quirking. "Laundry, really."

She made a face as he moved his long legs off of the chairs and pushed one towards her with a single foot, before stretching out against along the other two. "Yeah. I don't even want to think of how many dollars Chris and I plugged into the machines in my apartment building. Apparently wrestling tights fall under the category of fluff and fold."

"Did you threaten to shrink 'em?"

"It's all part of my devious plan to piss off my brother. Shrink his tights when he isn't looking, and then point and laugh when they rip up the ass. It's amusing for all involved," she said, her voice heavy in sarcasm. He laughed and rolled his eyes. She paused and gave him an appraising look. "Okay, what's with you? You're awfully quiet."

"I'm always quiet." Sighing, he folded down the corner of the page he was reading and closed the book, laying it on his thighs. "I was reading."

"You're always reading," she said, giving him another smile. He couldn't help but chuckle at the way that Lauren was acting. "Chris has a meeting with Steve Austin, otherwise he'd be here. He actually trusted me to walk down the hall all by myself. I didn't even need to hold anyone's hand."

"How quickly you've grown up," he said drily. "We're still bunking together, or are you leaving me for your brother?"

She lowered her head and fluttered her eyelashes, getting another laugh from the man. "There's only one blond Canadian man close to my heart." She paused and laughed. "I was going to say that his name doesn't start with _Chris_ but I guess it kinda does. But yeah, that's the plan. We're still kind of...off."

"I thought that spending some time together would've helped."

Lauren shrugged. "It started out fine. We were getting along great, but I don't know if I said something wrong or did something, but he just kind of stiffened up again. He says he's not feeling well, though. Might be coming down with something, which is another reason not to room with him."

Christian looked at her seriously, shaking his head slowly. "Never tell anyone that. You never want to announce any kind of weakness to anyone. You never know who your friends are around here."

Chagrined, she sat back in her chair. "Well, you're safe to tell. But it's true. I think he's got a flu or a cold or something. He definitely doesn't look good. Not that he ever has."

"You're missing my point," Christian said drily, shaking his head. He went on to explain as the door to the locker room swung open hard, bouncing against the wall as Chris Jericho stalked into the room, muttering to himself. "And of course, it's not a normal day in the WWF without Jericho throwing a hissy fit," he said instead.

Lauren rolled her eyes. "What's up?

"Nothing," Chris said shortly, before throwing his gear under the bench.

It was Christian's turn to roll his eyes before he leaned back in his chair, looking at Chris upside down. "What's on the agenda for tonight?"

"Tag match. Qualifier for number one contender," Chris said angrily, sitting down as he dug through his bag. He muttered to himself and swore as he pulled his contact lens case and tights out of his bag, going over to the bathroom and slamming the door shut behind him.

With a quick bounce of his eyebrows, Christian chuckled to himself and picked up his book again, opening it. "See why I spend so much time reading in here?" he asked Lauren in a low voice, turning his attention back to the page. When he peeked over at her and saw the confused look on her face, he smiled and went on to explain. "Your brother's mad because it isn't a singles match. Particularly, it isn't a singles match for the title. He's stuck with me, going for the tag belts."

"It's still a title belt, isn't it?" she asked, shaking her head. "I thought that the tag belts were a big thing."

"They are. If you're a tag team competitor. It's not as special as holding the heavyweight title." Shaking his head, he turned the page and continued to read. "Besides, he and I aren't that great of a team. We don't mesh well. We have to put a lot more planning into it."

She nodded. "Unlike you and your brother. I, um...I looked up some old matches of yours online. You guys worked really well together."

The bitter smile that she had seen a few days before, the last time either of them had mentioned his brother, reappeared on his face, twisting his handsome features. Lauren didn't particularly care for that look on his face. "You grow up with someone, work with him, live with him, you get to know him pretty well. We had an advantage." He stood up suddenly, his finger holding his place in the book. "I'm gonna go grab a cup of coffee. Want me to bring you back anything?"

She shook her head and thanked him, watching as he left the locker room, before swearing under her breath. That was a conversation that could have gone a bit better, she thought, the same time the door to the bathroom opened.

Chris reappeared, dressed in his wrestling tights and nothing else, dangling his eyeglasses from his hand. "Christian gone?" he asked casually, slipping his glasses into their case and tucking them into his bag.

Lauren made a face. "Was that what that whole show was about? The slamming of the door and anything?"

"You tell him that it was a show?"

Stubbornly, she shook her head. "I'm a lot of things, Chris, but I'm not an idiot. I know you had a reason why you wanted him out of the room. What was it?"

He rolled his shoulders before beginning to tug his knee pads into place, looking up at her with bright blue eyes. "Our match tonight is with the Dudley Boys. Remember who they are?" At her slow nod, he chuckled and shook his head. "No, you don't. They're the ones that like to use tables. Specifically, they like to put people through tables."

"I'm _so_ staying back here tonight," she said, crossing her arms.

Chris chuckled again, a little more humourless than last time. "As much as I'd like that, Austin was quick to tell me that you are required to walk out with us tonight. Which is why when you come out, you're going to stay as far away from the corner of the ring as possible. If they come near you, or if they get out of the ring, you go running away."

Standing up, she waved a hand at him dismissively, as Chris began to tug on and tie his boots. "We had this conversation last week."

"Yeah, and we're having it again this week. And we'll keep having it until you get it. You're a weakness out there, Lauren, and I'm starting to think that you're not going to understand that until someone actually goes after you. You were lucky last week, with us against Benoit and Edge. Neither of them had a reason to go after you. The Dudleys will go after you, because they like to."

Lauren rolled her eyes, huffing in impatience. "And let me guess, stay away from Christian, too, right? Because Lord knows he's going to snap at any second and try to hurt me, even though he's been nothing but a sweetheart towards me." She made a face. "I'm a big girl, Chris, I can handle myself."

He nodded as he strapped on one of his shin pads, adjusting the bottom so that it lay on his boot properly. "Okay. Tell me that when Buh-Buh Ray puts you back first through a table. I'm not kidding, Lauren. He gets some perverse joy out of putting people through tables, women especially. It'll probably break you in half, but hey, you wanna be a big girl? Go for it. Don't fucking listen to me."

She stalked over to the door and let herself out, turning to look over her shoulder. "I think I'm going to go find Christian. I'll see you before your match," she told him coldly, before letting the door shut behind her.

Chris swore. He tried to warn her, but she just wouldn't listen.

* * *

Lauren stood off to the side as Chris posed at the top of the ramp, listening to the crowd react badly to him. She narrowed her eyes and glared out over the audience as Chris spun on his heel to face the ring, motioning for her to join him. She stepped out of the corner and took her place behind him, giving a cold look to someone who was holding up a sign that insulted her brother. While he kept his eyes forward, she scanned the crowd, her expression becoming more and more sour.

"Are all these people jerks?" she asked her brother, raising her voice to be heard over the crowd.

Chris shot her a bad look, shaking his head. "No, they think that I am," he answered, as someone near him, leaning over the security barrier, shouted an insult at his little sister. Without looking, he lifted his middle finger and flipped the guy off, getting a fresh round of jeers. He rolled his eyes and pulled himself up onto the ring, holding the ropes open for his sister to enter.

Jericho's theme music shut off and Christian's started soon after that, Lauren's icy face finally breaking into a bit of a smile as she watched the man make his way down towards them, determination on his face. He smiled slightly to her and nodded to Jericho, before climbing in the ring and coming to stand with them. That only left their opponents.

The Dudley Boys came out to raucous cheers and applause, the blood-thirsty crowd knowing that there was a good chance someone was going to go through a table that night. For the past four weeks, someone had gone through one, and Chris Jericho's sister, the quiet and rarely moving Lauren, would probably be the one to get it. She made a face as Chris sat down on the ropes, pulling up on the other one to let her out. He wanted her out of the ring before the Dudleys climbed in and posed on the turnbuckles for the fans.

She skirted the corner of the ring and faltered for a moment, tripping over her own foot when her eyes met those of Buh-Buh Ray Dudley, surprised by the coldness in them. She was beginning to understand what Chris had been warning her about, but refused to let it show any further, not wanting to give her brother the satisfaction of knowing that she had heard him. She took her place at the corner and purposely stood next to Christian's feet, meeting her brother's eyes for a moment. Chris gave her a look that was close to a sneer before he began the match.

It was different from the match that they had fought against Benoit and Edge. In the first match, there had been a fair amount of technically sound wrestling, a number of holds and submissions and throws that had been exchanged between the four men. The match she was watching now was more brutal, more fighting than wrestling. Both Dudleys used their hands, or more accurately, a closed fist despite the referee constantly yelling at them for it and giving them five counts for disqualification throughout most of the match. Lauren made a face, wondering how the poor man in the striped shirt was going to be able to talk in the morning with all the screaming he was doing, when she heard a startled shout from her brother, his body coming crashing down to the mat near the ropes where she was standing.

D-Von, the other Dudley, stalked towards Chris and Lauren jumped backwards when he came near, getting out of reach of his arms to be on the safe side. The large black man gave her a derisive look as he picked up her brother by his long blond hair, his fingers tangling in the curls and bringing Chris back to his feet. She wrung her hands as she watched her brother get tossed around, knocked down and picked up again only to be thrown once more. Unable to help herself, she slammed her hand down onto the mat, ignoring the sharp pain in her palm, and shouted encouragement to Chris, surprised when the audience responded by booing her loudly.

"Oh, shut up," she screamed back, which only caused them to get louder and Christian to flick his eyes down towards her, before stretching himself out over the top rope, his hand extended, waiting for the tag. Chris stirred as D-Von went after him again, mule-kicking the man in the jaw, before leaping the short distance to his tag team partner, rolling under the bottom rope as Christian entered the ring.

Instinctively, she wanted to run over to her Chris and make sure that he was all right, but he was pulling himself back up with the help of the ropes and she instead cupped her hands around her mouth, shouting for Christian as he whipped the larger man into the ropes. Lauren groaned when Buh-Buh Ray got the tag, bursting into the ring, fresh man against fresh man.

After that, the tags came fast and furiously, both teams using them to their advantage to double team their opponents. Lauren laid her hands down on the ring apron, feeling the shudder run through the canvas each time someone got dropped on it. She jumped and shouted when Christian got the upper hand in the match, smirking across the ring at Buh-Buh Ray as he looked on furiously. Little did she know that it would be the wrong thing to do.

Within minutes, Christian was thrown through the ropes to the protective padding outside the ring, landing awkwardly, and Chris was knocked down on the mat, out of breath and blinking rapidly, but not moving. Biting her lip, Lauren ran around the ring, holding onto the post as she rounded the corner in her low heeled boots, bending down beside Christian with a hand on his back. "Are you all right?" she asked in a panicked voice, her only answer the low groan that came from him as her hand fell away, the man rolling onto his back and looking straight up at the ceiling. She got up from her crouch to look and see where Chris was, screaming out in surprise when a hand fisted itself into her dark hair, giving her a hard tug.

She pushed herself up on the ring apron the same time she was being lifted by only her hair, trying to lessen the pressure on her head, her hands batting at the person who was holding her. The crowd cheered wildly as D-Von wrapped his arms around her, pinning her own arms in place, and she bucked against him, trying to get free. It was only then that she realized, a little dimly, that the crowd had been cheering for awhile.

The large black man spun her around in the ring, and her eyes widened when she saw the table that had been set up while she had been distracted by checking on Christian, Buh-Buh Ray sitting on the turnbuckle with a fevered expression on his face. Lauren increased her fight, stamping her foot down on D-Von's, but the big man seemed to be unaffected by her fighting. "No, no, please no," she begged, as D-Von steered her towards the other man. His arms adjusted their hold, and while his grip slackened for a moment, she fought harder, managing to jam her elbow into his stomach.

But all D-Von did was grunt and then lift her up, a terrified scream ripping its way through her lips as her thighs were situated over Buh-Buh Ray's shoulders. She squirmed and screamed as his hands fisted into the sides of her pants, dipping underneath the waistband and holding tight to her. Lauren clung to him, her hands clasping behind his head in a desperate attempt not to get thrown through the table. Faintly, over her own screams, she heard a shift in the volume from the crowd and felt Buh-Buh Ray stand up on the turnbuckle, getting raised with him.

Lauren's eyes closed tight as she felt the large man launch off of the turnbuckle, her tangled hair flying forward as she felt the air rush by her bare arms. She honestly thought, when she was first brought into the ring, that her time flying through the air, her legs over Buh-Buh Ray's shoulders, were going to last forever, but the impact happened quickly. She groaned low in her chest as her back landed on the canvas with a loud thud, and she barely managed to tuck her chin towards her chest in order to keep her head from slamming back with her.

Oddly enough, she heard no wood cracking and felt no splinters digging into her skin as she lay on the mat, too stunned to move, in too much pain to even roll herself over and out of the ring. Her eyes opened and she saw a blurry figure run past her with a familiar shout, the sound of flesh hitting flesh meeting her ears.

Hands landed on her, gentler than the ones from before, and she whimpered in pain as Christian rolled her over, tugging her towards the edge of the ring and apologizing under his breath every time she let out another pitiful sound. "I've got you," he said quietly in her ear, wrapping an arm around her and helping her to the ground. She cried out and crumpled against him, his arm holding her up around her back as a loud thud sounded from the ring, followed by three slaps against the canvas.

"Your winners...Chris Jericho and Christian!" the ring announcer's voice called out over the speakers, and Chris rolled out of the ring, breathing heavily as he came to Lauren's other side, giving Christian a glare as he transferred the dead weight of his sister to his side instead.

"What happened?" Lauren asked softly, her throat raw from her screaming fit a few moments before, barely able to pick up her feet as Chris directed her to the side of the ramp, choosing to take the flat floor exit, rather than make her walk the rest of the way. She stumbled over a thick cable on the ground and groaned.

Chris took advantage of her moan of pain and bent at the knees, swiftly picking her up and continuing on, her face pressing against his shoulder as she tried not to scream at the pull of her bruising back. "I got the table out of the way. I told you, Laurie," he said, between deep breaths. Christian scurried ahead and held back the curtain for them, allowing the brother and sister to go through before him, falling into step quickly once they had passed by him.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, as an EMT came running up to them, directing Chris to a nearby room that had a stretcher set up, laying his sister across it when he was motioned to.

"I know," Chris said, and as he stepped back to watch the medical professionals swoop down on his little sister, checking her for serious injuries, he shoved a hand through his sweat streaked hair, hoping to hell that she had learned her lesson that time.


	7. Chapter Six

**Bound and Chained: Edge of Reason  
Chapter Six**

Letting himself into the hotel room, Chris threw his bag towards the door-less closet, rounding the corner towards the main part of the room, and stopped himself from exclaiming in surprise when he saw someone sitting in the corner. "Jesus. How in the hell did you get in here? No, wait, don't answer that," he continued, holding up a hand before his surprise guest could say anything. "I really don't want to know."

The man shrugged. "Suit yourself." He watched as Chris sat down on the bed and kicked off his sneakers. "How is she?"

Chris shrugged out of his jacket and threw it towards his open suitcase. "Sore. Bruised. But she was walking."

"Slowly, I'd imagine."

He nodded. "Yeah. Probably took fifteen minutes from the locker room to their rental car. I don't imagine she'll sleep much tonight, but at least she isn't in the hospital."

The man shrugged. "True. It was a nice save. It didn't look like you were going to get there in time to knock down D-Von and throw the table out of the way. I still don't know how she didn't realize that they were setting up a table in the ring. That definitely won't be her one shining moment in the WWF."

Chris was strangely quiet for a moment, before he turned to look at his guest with a shrewd look. "Austin set it up," he said quietly, almost smiling at the surprised look he got in return. "I know. I wasn't expecting him to do something so obvious, but he did. D-Von Dudley was leaving Austin's locker room just as I was getting there. I don't think he realizes that I saw, but why else would he be talking to the Dudleys?"

"That's about the only reason I can think of. Unless he was planning to offer them a contract, but I think of a tag team or two that he would want more. But why? What did your sister do to piss off Austin already?"

"She didn't interfere in a match when he told her to." He shook his head. "I don't know what Austin wasn't expecting. She's too inexperienced to do something like that. Lauren wouldn't wait for the right moment; she'd just do it and get it over as quickly as possible. And I told her not to. For once, she actually listened to me. Guess it's kinda my fault, too," he admitted, looking away for a moment. "I heard that he wasn't too pleased with her, but she didn't say anything to me."

His guest made a face. "Getting put through a table would be a hell of a lesson. Of course, the hit she took is a hell of a lesson, too. She looked like she'd been in a car accident when the camera turned towards her. I saw it three times, and lemme tell you, it doesn't get any better on subsequent viewings." Sighing, the man met Chris's eyes. "She's really gotten herself into this, hasn't she? It's your call, Jericho."

"My call? My call for what?"

"If you want to bring her in on this. I mean, she's getting in the way, anyway. I'm sorry, Jericho, I know she's your little sister, but it's true. It might just be easier to tell her what you've really been up to the past while, and get her to help. Two sets of ears and eyes are better than one."

Chris swore. "That's not part of the deal, man. I don't _want_ her involved. I want her as far away from this as I can. Besides, I'm not sure of her intentions here, much as I hate to admit it. Let's just say that our little meeting at her place didn't go that well."

The man in the corner shrugged his shoulders and leaned back in the chair, reaching for the to-go cup of coffee on the table. He took a sip and when Chris didn't continue, he spoke again. "What do you mean, Jericho? I thought you were going to talk some sense into her."

"And we saw how that went," Chris said, rolling his eyes. "Look, my contact with my sister has been limited at best for the past few years. We've both been busy, and I figured that if I was helping her out with her tuition payments and rent, the least I could do was not distract her so that she'd make good grades. But my sister...Lauren's never been a happy person. When she was a kid, it was nothing more than trying to cause trouble. But as she got older, she needed to be the center of attention. She needed to be perfect according to everyone else, and she needed to be right."

With a snort, the man put down his cup of coffee. "Sounds like it runs in the family." At the bad look he received from Chris, he shrugged. "Sorry, Jericho, but it's true. You two seem to have a lot in common. Have you ever thought about sitting her down and actually talking to her about what's going on here? You never know, it might work."

"But then she wouldn't be the ministering angel." He laughed, though it was almost devoid of humour, at the look he received. "You don't know her, man. I'm starting to think that she's here more for her friends than for me, so that when her year is over, she can go home and tell them all these great stories about how she made me see the light or some bullshit like that. Don't get me wrong, I love Lauren, but there are times when I could throttle the girl."

"You're getting away from the subject at hand, Jericho."

"No, I'm not. You want to bring her into this, and we don't even know what she's going to do? Okay, sure, my family might have an issue with their egos. We may be the biggest fucking egomaniacs that you've ever met before...though I'd find that hard to believe, what with you being you and all. But I think she'll screw this up, and then where are you going to be? If we bring Lauren in, and she fucks it up for all of us, what are we going to do? We're going to have to put up with Austin and his power trip for a long damned time. I know you don't want that, and I sure as hell don't. He'll have this business in shambles."

The man raised his hands, as if he were being backed into a corner. And he was, although it was a verbal corner. "Okay, okay, fair enough. We can revisit the situation later. I just figured, with her being hurt like that- "

"Oh, don't worry. She'll milk it for all it's worth, especially now that she has Christian wrapped around her little finger."

The man paused for a moment, wondering if he should say anything. "Yeah, I kind of noticed that tonight. I've seen concern for valets before, but his seemed a little above and beyond. Is there anything to that story? Because we still don't know where Christian stands in all of this."

Chris pushed a hand through his hair, and shook his head. "I don't really give a shit where Christian stands. He made his mistakes, just like I did. All I know is that I'm trying to rectify the situation. I don't see him lifting a damned finger." Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and tried to calm himself down. "No, I don't think there's anything there. He's just happy to have a friend, I think. He and I aren't exactly tight, and there isn't anyone else backstage that really talks to him. Turning on your own brother doesn't sit well with a lot of people."

"You know, it might be worth setting up a meeting with him- "

"Now your ego is getting out of hand," Chris said disgustedly. "Like I said, we don't know where he stands. I would know, better than anyone, and I have no idea where his loyalties lie. It's not worth it."

The man in the chair bristled, his shoulders becoming tense, before he stood up. "You're not running this show, Jericho. May I remind you of that?"

Chris smirked and shook his head. "And neither are you. _Austin_ is running the fucking show. He's been running it for too long. Why the hell are we going over this again? It's not like we don't know all of the fucking details."

"Maybe you just need to be reminded of what your role is around here. Why did you sign that contract with Austin?"

"Oh, for fuck's sake." Chris stood up and walked over to his suitcase. Unzipping it, he dug through it, upsetting the neatly folded clothes inside, as he pulled out a pair of sweat pants and a tee shirt. "In case you didn't notice, I'm trying to get you to leave."

"Why'd you sign that contract with Austin, Jericho?"

He threw the clothes towards the bed, his face getting red. "Because the company wasn't doing shit with me. I was better than that. They wouldn't take a chance on me, one fucking chance. They kept pushing me down, because I was smaller. Never mind the fact that I've been doing this since high school. Never mind the fact that this is my life. Never mind the fact that I'm good, that I'm smart. It's all because I was fucking smaller than the top guys. What the fuck does size have to do with anything? Doesn't it have to do with talent?"

The man nodded calmly once Chris was finished with his tirade, completely unruffled by the rant. "And what did you get from Austin?"

"A world full of fucking heartache, man. And now Lauren-"

"Take your sister out of the equation for a moment. Forget the fact that she's here. What has Austin given you? You signed a contract based on _maybe_ and _one day_, didn't you, Jericho? Have you seen any _maybe_ or _one day_ happen yet?"

Closing his eyes, he took a few deep breaths, trying to calm himself. "No, I haven't," he ground out, gritting his teeth. "He's doing the same fucking thing to me that the company did. He tosses me an occasional bone, like an Intercontinental shot, and now he has me with Christian for the tag belts. I didn't sign on with him to hold the fucking Intercontinental title again." Opening his eyes, he looked at the man in the corner. "It would have been fine if he just wanted to fuck with me. I made my bed, I'll lie in it. But it's not just me that he's fucking with."

"No, he's fucking with a lot of people. People that don't deserve it. I don't know why, but he has something up his sleeve." The other man sighed and looked away, towards the window. "I just wish I knew what."

"He's gaining his power, man. What happens when he has enough?"

"We're not going to let it get to that point."

* * *

She winced as she shifted on the couch, realizing her mistake just after it happened. The last thing she had wanted was to show any sort of weakness when she was with Austin. She quickly schooled her face into as neutral an expression as possible, looking at the silent man out of the corner of her eye.

If it had been possible, she would have come into the arena that night without showing her pain, but it was next to impossible. The swelling had gone down on her lower back, thanks to her following both the trainer and Christian's instructions, spending most of the last night alternating between ice packs and a heating pad as she tried to sleep. The bruising wasn't as bad as it could have been, but what no one could see was the worst. Every time she moved, her muscles would protest, sending sharp pains up and down her back. When she didn't move, it was a deep throb that alternated from just plain bad to excruciating.

Lauren was moving at half-speed, if that. Christian had been uncomplaining that day, matching his pace to hers, despite the fact that she knew he usually walked with long strides, to match with his long legs. He had walked by her side and let her grab at his arm whenever she needed to rest. Coming into the arena that night, he had walked slightly ahead of her, allowing her to grab onto the strap of his bag as it hung over his shoulder, shuffling behind him, barely able to pick her feet up off the ground that night. He had settled her in the locker room, with the spare pillow he had swiped from the hotel, and gone to check the match listings, coming back to tell her that she had a meeting with Austin.

Which led her to where she was at the moment. Sitting on the couch in Austin's impromptu office, trying not to jitter like she normally would when faced with him, trying not to make a face at her uncomfortableness, and trying to figure out just what the hell was going on.

It had been the night before, the night of being tossed down to the mat with tremendous force by Buh-Buh Ray Dudley, that Austin had called and granted her the night off, but asked her to show up at the arena, in case he had something to discuss with her. Christian had been the one to answer the phone, which certainly wasn't surprising to Lauren, since it was Christian's cell phone that the call had come in on. He had frowned when he had passed her the phone, and it only got worse as she readily agreed to what Austin had asked of her, but he had refused to say just why he didn't like the idea of her showing up at the arena.

A grunt broke her out of her thoughts, and she watched as Austin sat down on a folding chair in front of her. "You hurt?" he asked gruffly.

Fighting to keep her face smooth, she shrugged her shoulders lightly. "It's not as bad as I thought it would be," she answered honestly and softly. Because the truth was, she had been anticipating not being able to move that morning when she woke up. The fact that she could was amazing to her. She could still _feel_ the impact of her back against the canvas if she thought about it.

"Good."

The quiet in the room was overwhelming. This was what he had asked to meet her about? A single question? Fighting the urge to roll her eyes, she put her hands down on the couch beside her and pushed, trying not to groan as she stood up. Instinct wanted her to put her hand to the small of her back, as if she could hold in the pain while she moved, but instead, she took a few tiny steps towards the door. "If that's everything, I think I'll go and see my brother."

"You know what his match is tonight?"

She stopped and turned slowly, hoping that the small movements would lessen the pain. It didn't. "Christian said something about a tag match. I don't know against who."

"The Hardys."

Lauren sighed patiently. "They're the champions, right? I thought that they weren't supposed to face them until the next pay per view. Isn't that in a month?"

"Yup. Non-title match. You know about the Hardys?"

She should have stayed sitting down, she thought idly to herself, trying to make herself more comfortable on her feet. Lauren settled for leaning back and resting her shoulders on the wall near the door, keeping her lower back far away from it. She was sure that she looked ridiculous. "They're brothers. They have the title belts." With a frown, she thought about the little information she had on them. Quite honestly, outside of Chris and Christian's matches, she didn't watch most of the show. "There's a woman that goes out there with them. Lita?"

"Yup." Quiet again. She nervously licked her lips. "You're gonna go out there tonight. Even up the odds a little."

She forced a laugh. "Even the odds? She's a wrestler, isn't she? That's not really evening the odds." She shook her head and bit back a curse when her neck protested. "I can't go out there. I can barely walk."

For a large man, Austin could move quickly when he wanted to. In the blink on an eye, he was standing, in her face, glaring down at her with those cold eyes. "Did I ask you?"

"I'm hurt. I'm in pain. I'm not going out there," she told him, her tone bordering on a whine. What part of it didn't he understand, she wondered. He had given her the night off because she was sore, because she was injured. Why was he suddenly asking her - telling her - that she was going to be accompanying her brother and her friend to ringside. The whole situation was ridiculous to her. "You gave me the night off."

Even as he moved closer to her, his voice became louder. "Did I say this was a God damned debate? You're going out there. And you're going to take out Lita while you're at it. If she gets an opening, she'll take it. You're gonna stop her, you understand me?"

"I can't. I can barely walk," she said. The whine was becoming more apparent, and she hated herself for it. There was something about the man that absolutely terrified her, and she wished she could put her finger on just what it was, but she couldn't. Taking a deep breath, she tried to push away the fear, and found herself trying to be like her brother, trying to channel that coldness that he seemed to always have. "I'm not going out there."

No good. Her voice wavered.

And Austin was like a predator that smelled blood. His hand shot out and grabbed her arm, pulling the woman even closer to him, ignoring her yelp of pain as he did so. "Let's get this straight right now. I'm your boss, yes?" When she didn't answer, he tightened his hand. "I am your boss, yes?"

"Yes!" she cried out. "Let me go!"

"So you do what I tell you too, right? Right, Lauren?"

She hated the way he said her name. Her head bobbed up and down, and the pain brought tears to her eyes. "Yes. Just please, let go of me."

Austin did let go of her, but not before pushing her away from him like he was disgusted by her. Her back hit the wall before she could stop herself, and she let out of a moan of pain, her vision dimming for a moment as the world swam before her. Austin became nothing but a blur for a few seconds, and she blinked, trying to see through her tears. "I say _jump_, you don't even say _how high_. You just fucking jump. I don't want no fucking questions when I tell you to do something. We clear?" She nodded again, moaned again. The pain was worse. "So now, when I tell you that you're gonna walk out there tonight with Jericho and Christian, you're going to..." He trailed off and gave her a pointed look.

When she didn't answer right away, he took a threatening step towards her, and she spoke quickly, almost tripping over the words. "I walk out with Chris and Christian."

"And when I tell you that you're gonna interfere and knock that little redhead around, you're going to..."

"I'm going to go and hit Lita." It was the wrong answer, as he stepped towards her again and she cowered. "I'm going to take her out so that she can't interfere in the match." A single tear slipped down her cheek.

Leaning towards her, Austin grinned and lightly tapped her on the side of her face, watching as she paled when he came close. He patted her face again and then leaned back. "Good girl. There's hope for you yet."


	8. Chapter Seven

**Bound and Chained : Edge of Reason  
Chapter Seven**

Lauren hurried down the hallway of the arena as quickly as she could, which was closer to her normal walking speed than anything. The pain was radiating in waves along her back, and despite it being worse than before, she knew - she just _knew_ - that she had to get the hell away from Austin and as far away from his room as possible. She fought the urge to look over her shoulder, to see if he was watching after her, not wanting to see those icy eyes directed at her. She shuffled along and bent her head towards her feet, her hair falling in her face to block her vision so all she could see were the scuffed and comfortable sneakers she was wearing.

She bound her arms tightly around herself as if trying to ward off a chill. She wanted to avoid looking at the people around her, knowing that they were all strangers to her. There were faces that she recognized from television, but she couldn't necessarily put named to the faces and she didn't want to. This wasn't her world. She didn't belong back there. She belonged in the libraries at her university, searching records and books for mentions of cases in footnotes and trying to understand the more involved laws she came across in her lectures. If she had learned anything from the past night of being practically driven through the mat by someone who outweighed her by probably more than a hundred and fifty pounds, it was the fact that she didn't belong there, just like Chris had been telling her all along. The world of wrestling was a foreign language to her.

Words like _interfere_, _foreign object_, and _gold_ had different meanings in that world. _Suplex_, _arm drag_, _hip toss_...to her, it really was another language. Christian had tried to explain to her the differences between certain throws and grapples, but even when guessing, she had less than a fifty percent accuracy in getting them right. She felt like a fraud, like she never should have been offered the contract in the first place. Her back alone was a good indicator that she never should have signed her name to the contract that Steve Austin had handed her. And even worse, hearing that she was going to have to _take out_ Lita made it certain: she was in the wrong business.

Her thoughts were cut off when she walked into someone, her head smarting and her back protesting as she started to fall backwards. She let out more of a pained gasp than a shout of surprise, her arms beginning to pinwheel in order for her to keep her balance. The muscular wall that got in her way wrapped its large hands around her arms, and she looked up in surprise as her momentum was interrupted, her eyes widening with fear when she saw Matt Hardy looking down at her curiously, Lita by his side. Speak of the fucking devil, was her first thought. Oh, God, my back, just kill me now, was her second.

"Are you okay?" he asked, as he helped her back onto her feet. There was a silence as both of them examined her, and the slight concern in his eyes disappeared, turning cold. Lauren let out a ragged breath. Just what the hell was it around there, with all the cold looks and sneers, she wondered idly. "You're Jericho's sister, aren't you?"

She nodded to both statements, unable to speak for a moment, because she knew when she opened her mouth, all that would come out would be a painful moan. Instead, chancing the twinge of pain in her neck, she looked away. These two, she knew, if only because Chris and Christian had a match against the Hardys that night, and Austin had told her that Lita was going to be standing in their corner. She glanced back at him when he hadn't let go of her arms and sighed. "Lauren," she answered, her voice almost a whisper. "Do you...you _do_ know who you're fighting tonight."

The redheaded woman gave her an appraising look as Matt let go of Lauren. "So long as you don't get involved, I won't have any reason to go after you," Lita told her, and then smiled a little. "Besides, I don't imagine you'll be doing much after that hit you took last night."

For a moment, Lauren felt rooted to the spot, remembering what Austin had told her before. She had to listen to him this time, she knew that. The tirade that he had gone off on, the way he had grabbed her, the way that he had thrown her back towards the wall and knowing that it would cause her pain...there was nothing she could do but listen this time. She knew her brother would protest, but she would just have to ignore Chris. She knew Christian would give her that look, that damned look that said he knew that she had been asked to do something and he understood but he'd rather that she didn't, and she would have to turn a blind eye to it.

She bit her lip and looked away again, trying to find a way out of the situation. Finally, she did what her brother would have done and straightened her shoulders, trying her damnedest to ignore the pain, raising her chin to look defiantly at the other woman. If Chris could act like a jerk, she was sure that she could, too. She had learned a few tricks from her older brother over the years, after all. Her voice became cool as she met Lita's eyes. "Have you ever seen me interfere before?" she asked. Oh, she knew she probably looked like a little puppy trying to nip at the heels of the big dogs, but she didn't see any other way out of the situation.

"Doesn't mean you won't, but I doubt it with your back. And if you do - "

"Yeah, yeah. You'll beat the crap out of me," Lauren threw back at her, almost smiling when she saw the look of surprise on both of their faces. They hadn't expected that from the mostly quiet girl that stood at ringside like she was terrified of moving. "If you'll excuse me, I have to go and get ready."

"Ready for what? Standing there?" Lita asked as Lauren took a deep breath, holding it in and trying to imagine that it was her pain she was holding in. She pushed between them, continuing her trek down the hallway. She shrugged her shoulders, biting her lip and rounded the corner, letting the fake confidence slip away, her shoulders bowing again once she was sure they couldn't see her. Her teeth released her lip and she took a few ragged breaths, until the worst of the pain was over. When she continued on to the locker room that had been assigned to the three of them that night, she went back to walking slowly, shuffling her feet and keeping her feet down to the ground.

She pushed her way into the locker room and looked up, only to see two sets of blue eyes from two blond men looking back at her. Forcing a smile on her face, Lauren walked into the room slowly, letting the door swing shut behind her. "I'm going out there with you tonight," she said decisively.

Yeah, there was the look from Christian, and it was just like she had thought it would be. She turned away and looked at Chris, waiting for the explosion, but he just turned away and shrugged his shoulders as he tucked away his eyeglass case. "Whatever," he said.

She blinked, sharing another look with Christian, though the second was more confused than anything. "Whatever?" she asked. "Where's the big production? The ranting and raving and arm waving?" She knew that she was trying to goad him into a fight, but that was what the siblings did best. The lack of reaction was something she hadn't been anticipating. She had geared herself up for a fight, so where was it?

Chris turned to face her. "What's the point? You're going to do what you want. Or what Austin tells you to. I'm tired of wasting my breath on you, when you don't listen. I would've thought that you'd have learned something after last night, but it doesn't look like you did. I'm done."

She opened her mouth and closed it rapidly, her eyes wide, and Christian was reminded vaguely of a fish out of water. She looked surprised...hell, _he_ was surprised that Chris wasn't taking it any further. "Done? But you're never done," she said, shaking her head. "You _can't_ be _done_. There's just no way."

Shrugging his shoulders, Chris finished with his bag and tucked it away to avoid tripping over it, giving her a once over with slightly reddened eyes. "Yes, I can," he said mildly. "I give you advice, you don't follow it. What's the point of saying it again? You're not going to listen again. It's a waste of everyone's time. I don't see what point of this you don't understand."

She narrowed her eyes and took it to a level that she was sure he would respond to. Sure, maybe it was petty and maybe it was childish, but he _always_ had an opinion about what she did. "So, you're saying that you don't care anymore?"

"Nice try. You're not going to goad me into a fight."

"_Excuse me_? I'm not trying to goad you into anything, you ass," she lied, tossing her hair out of her face. "Especially a fight. You think I like fighting with you?"

"Yup," Chris said, taking a step towards her. His hands descended to her shoulders and he placed a kiss on the top of her head, half expecting her to take a swing at him. "It's what we do. And I refuse to do it. Laurie, you want to make a go at this business, go ahead. You have my blessing. But I'm not going to waste my breath on you anymore. You make a mistake, you can come crying to me, but all I'm gonna do is sit there and say that I told you do. I'm not helping you anymore."

"I came here for you," she told him hotly, glaring up at him as he broke away.

"Could've fooled me." With that, he picked up a discarded tee shirt and pulled it over his head, nodding at Christian. "I'll be back before the match." And without a second look backwards, he strode out of the room.

She groaned and waved her middle finger at the closing door, flicking her eyes towards Christian. "Can you believe that shit?" she grumbled.

He gave her a tolerant smile and stood up. "Is that what you're wearing tonight?" he asked her. At her nod, he motioned for her to follow him towards the bathroom. "Come on, I'll help you get ready for tonight. I just figure that if we do this in the main part of the room, your brother will come in here and accuse us of something." She rolled her eyes and huffed like an angry teenager as he followed her into the bathroom, easing the door shut behind him.

"What's all this?" she asked.

"Lift up the back of your shirt," he directed, watching as she did so. "You'll have to wear your jacket tonight to cover the back, but this should help you move better. It's just some Icy Hot and one of those twelve hour heating pads, but I'd rather not watch you try your contortionist exercises." As he spoke, he opened the container on the counter and started to spread the lotion on her back, making a face when he was done and washing his hands.

"My God, that stuff smells like - "

"Yeah, I know. But it'll help," Christian said, before helping her band the heating pad around her, handing her the ends to connect in the front. Once she was finished and it was secure, he took the elastic bandage on the counter and wrapped it around her, in order to keep the heating pad in place while she moved. "Sorry, the trainer only had the large size ones. But this should work. You'll feel it if you land on it, though."

"Is this the locker room idea of romance?" she asked, looking down at the bandage circling her midsection.

He chuckled as he helped her lower the bottom of her tank top, settling it back in place. "Yeah. Second base includes braces and splints." He helped her turn around and made a seesaw motion with his face. "It doesn't look too bad from the front. But the back definitely shows. You will need your jacket," he confirmed.

Biting her lip, she looked away for a moment. "I can interfere in this?" At his slow and reluctant nod, she smiled. "Thanks, Christian. You're the best."

* * *

The muscle cream and the heating pad helped to loosen her muscles, and she was walking almost normally down the ramp to the ring, trailing behind her brother as she normally did. She kept her face forward, blinking against the camera flashes from the crowd and the pulsing lights overhead. For the first time since she had started to walk out with her brother and her friend, Lauren didn't climb into the ring with him, instead going over to the corner he motioned to immediately and took her place, her hands in her back pockets.

"The following contest is a non-title match. Introducing first, accompanied by Lauren Jericho, and weighing in at two hundred and twenty five pounds, Chris Jericho."

As if startled, Lauren looked up at her brother, trying not to make a face as she examined him. Maybe the ring announcer needed to get her eyes checked, because her brother certainly didn't look like he weighed quite that much, she thought idly.

"And his partner, weighing in at two hundred and thirty five pounds, Christian!"

Lauren fought not to giggle as her eyes bounced between the two men, snorting lightly when she catalogued their differences. Christian had an inch or two on her brother, which may have accounted for the extra ten pounds, but she still couldn't see either of them weighing as much as they were announced. There had to be some fudging of the numbers, she figured. Then again, she had tried to get Christian off of his feet when he had been training her, and he felt like he had weighed three hundred or so pounds.

Her mirth disappeared when the Hardys were introduced, one wearing the tag team belt around his waist, the other carrying his over his shoulder, and the redheaded woman standing between them. Lauren felt herself stiffen as she watched them play up their way down to the ring. She backed up from the corner of the ring and found herself standing near the announce table, faintly hearing one man appreciating the view and the other wondering if she was going to try to interfere that night, as she had yet to do so.

She took a deep breath as the referee took the belts and handed them to someone outside the ring, before motioning for the bell. She had noticed, in the few other matches that she had been out there for, Chris usually jumped into the ring first, as if he were eager to get the match over with, but this time, it was Christian that started off the match. From what Christian had told her after helping her get ready for the match, he had the most experience with the Hardys, since he and his brother had been constantly fighting with them over the belts.

Every now and then, she could take her attention off the match and looked towards the opposite corner, only to see Lita giving her a speculative look, as if wondering if she was going to make a move. Trying to look innocent, Lauren removed her hands from her back pockets and held them up, taking a step backwards. Lita tossed her head and slapped her hand against the mat, calling for the Hardy brother in the ring, trying to encourage him. Not to be outdone, Lauren did the same, meeting her eyes again and getting a smirk in response.

"This sucks," she muttered to herself before cheering on her brother again, getting a look from Christian. Rolling her shoulders in a shrug, Lauren continued her cheering as her brother tagged out again. For the most part, they had isolated Matt Hardy towards their corner, and were tagging in and out constantly, making it seem more like a game than a match.

But the Hardys weren't multiple time tag team champions for no reason, and all it took was one solidly delivered kick from Matt to get away from Christian and tagged in his brother. Lauren heard the crowd scream in anticipation as Jeff Hardy climbed into the ring and she stepped back again, having been informed of what his wrestling style was. She winced as he threw himself around the ring, knocking down Christian and then taking a pot shot at her brother, before focusing on the former tag team champion again.

Even Lauren could see the flaw in his style, though, and while it looked exciting, it was too frenzied to control, and Christian got the upper hand again, knocking the young man down and tagging out again. Lauren glanced towards the other corner and noticed the change in Lita, who was standing still, her eyes watching the match carefully. She silently begged the woman not to interfere and took her own attention off the match to watch the redhead. When she saw her stir and placed her hand on the ring post, she bit back a groan. This was it. This is what Austin wanted her to do.

She held her breath when she saw Lita climbing up the turnbuckle, cursing to herself. Her pains were forgotten, thankfully dulled from the muscle cream and the heating pad, and she moved quickly. Rounding the corner, Lauren jogged to where the redhead was beginning to stand on the top turnbuckle. She knew she was going to regret what she was doing, but her mind was focused on the job at hand as she put one foot on the middle step of the steel stairs, using it to push herself higher in order to plant her other foot on the ring apron. In the uncomfortable position, she raised both hands and pushed at Lita, watching as the redhead fell off the turnbuckle and into the ring, jumping down quickly when she saw the look on Matt Hardy's face.

"Crap," she muttered to herself, jumping back down and biting her lip as the pain came flaring back. She started to go back to her own corner, where she figured she would be somewhat safe from the irate man that was trying to tell the referee what had happened. What she hadn't counted on was the fact that he gave up the fight almost immediately and used his long stride to make his way over to her. Maybe if she were faster, she could have run away from him, but she felt a hand fist itself into her hair, pulling her up. It was like the night before, all over again, as she was forced to climb back up, in order to lessen the pressure on her hair, and she cried out when she felt herself get flipped over the top rope, Matt Hardy finally letting go of her hair as she landed, trying to take most of the impact on her shoulders, where it hurt less.

She landed awkwardly, stunned for a moment and speechless from the pain, before she was pulled back up and Lita delivered a closed fist punch to her jaw. Lauren was let go again, and she fell to her knees, her hand going up to cup the place she had been punched, automatically working her jaw to see if anything had been broken. As she did so, a boot landed on her chest, pushing her back and through the ropes. She naturally twisted in mid air, landing on her hands and knees onto the mats outside. The crowd cheered loudly for Lita as she crouched on the ground, trying to get the air back into her body.

Because neither she nor Lita had interfered in the match, other than touching each other, the referee let it continue, and it ended sometime during the confusion. She peered through her hair to see her brother release the legal man out of the sitout pin he had him in, and felt a somewhat familiar arm wrap itself around her waist at the same time, helping her back to her feet. "Are you okay?" Christian asked her, as she shook her head wildly, and then groaned at the throbbing of the top of her head and her jaw. "You got more than you bargained for, huh?" he asked.

She straightened up and immediately put her hand on her lower back, glaring at the redheaded woman that was still in the ring. "You could say that," she grumbled, as the other woman smirked at her.

Chris rejoined them as they made their way up the ramp, looking down at his sister with an odd look, before he shook his head. "Damn it," he muttered, before throwing in a few more choice swears, shooting Christian a bad look as he watched the man tend to his little sister.

Lauren looked over at him, her expression a mix of pain and sorrow. "I had to," she said softly, bringing a hand up to rub her jaw again.

"I know."


	9. Chapter Eight

**Bound and Chained: Edge of Reason  
Chapter Eight**

If Lauren thought that she had seen her brother at his most angry during the past few weeks, she was sadly mistaken.

Both Lauren and Christian had been given off the last two days of house shows, giving them both a total of four days off. Even worse, in Chris's mind, those four days were the _same_ four days. And at the apex of the worst situation he could think of, the WWF had been touring in the southern United States, a very long plane trip away from Vancouver, British Columbia. Lauren had been more than smug when he had offered her the keys to his house in Florida, only for her to tell him that she was already going to Florida. Only she was going to be staying with Christian at his apartment.

Chris wasn't too sure what to think about Christian, other than the fact that he didn't like how the man had become the middleman in his relationship with his half-sister. At one time, he had considered Christian to be a good friend. There had been a group of them, back in Canada and long before their careers with the WWF, that had traveled and worked together more often than not, both of them included. Of course, he reasoned, back then, Christian and Edge still acted like the brothers they were, Chris hadn't seemingly turned his back on all of his friends, and Lauren had been nothing more than a casual mention of _my annoying little sister_.

He knew that he had a lot of issues with Christian, not including the recent addition of Lauren to the locker room. Whatever his intentions were, whatever his deal was with Steve Austin, they were good enough for the man to turn on the closest person to him: his own brother. Never mind the hypocrisy of the situation, it led Chris to believe that he wasn't trustworthy in the least. Chris had done some pretty nasty things in the past year, especially to those that he called friends, but Christian had done much of the same. At least now, Chris had his head on straight. He could say the same for Christian.

And perhaps the thing that made him worry the most was the fact that Lauren was Christian's type. He made a face as the thought went through his head. He had met a few of Christian's girlfriends over the years, and aside from a token blonde or two, most of them looked like Lauren. Dark skinned, dark haired, small and intelligent. No matter how much Lauren had sworn that she was his friend and nothing else, he couldn't help but wonder just what Christian's intentions were. And with what was sitting beside him, he had a good idea of just what those intentions were.

Chris was broken out of his reverie when the door to the locker room opened, and his sister practically skipped in, one hand holding an iced coffee, the other pushing Christian playfully. Catching sight of her brother, she grinned. "Chris! Oh, you wouldn't believe how awesome my time off was. I got to sit around and suntan. I went shopping. I even got my first pay cheque. Of course, I've spent most of it already." She dropped her bag and kicked it under the bench, her smile turning to a smirk when he didn't respond. "Well, I see we aren't over our little hissy fit yet. What crawled up your butt and died this time?"

Rather than answer her, he turned his head to look towards Christian, his expression solemn. "I need to talk to Lauren. Alone."

It said a lot about the breakdown in their friendship when Christian turned to look at the woman rather than acknowledge his old friend. "Laur? You want me to leave? I don't mind staying."

"I'm sure you don't," came Chris's snide comment.

She rolled her eyes. "I'll be fine, Christian."

"If you honestly believe that I would hit my sister because I'm angry - "

"No, but I think you'd let your anger get the best of you." Christian remained rooted to the spot for a moment, sharing another look with Lauren, before he nodded. "I'll be down in catering. Call me if you need me."

Lauren nodded and waited for him to leave, before turning to look at her brother. "All right. Spill. What's got you so damned pissed off?"

A smirk slowly grew on his face. "Had some fun on your days off, huh? Relaxed, hung out with Christian. Looks like the time off was good for your back."

Rolling her eyes, Lauren reached for one of the folding metal chairs in the room, setting it up near Chris and sitting down on it, sipping her drink. "Wow. Well, at least I know that you actually listen to what I say. Is that why you kicked Christian out of the room? Because you wanted to repeat what I had told you? That ego really is getting bigger."

"Are you sleeping with him, Lauren?" Their eyes met, one pair angry, one pair surprised. Neither one of them said anything for a moment. "Tell me the truth. Are you sleeping with him?"

He didn't expect her to smirk back at him, cocking her head to the side. Very slowly, deliberately, she took another sip of her drink before sighing. "And if I were, Chris? Would that be any of your business? I'm not a little girl in braids anymore. I can fuck whoever I want." She shook her head. "I can't believe that you're actually asking me this. No, Chris, I'm not sleeping with him. And even if I was, it would be none of your business."

"You spent four days at his apartment with him."

"Uh huh. I know you've stayed there before. Are you sleeping with him?" she asked with mock sweetness, before she rolled her eyes again. "What is this about?"

"Uh, gee, maybe something to do with the fact that you were running around his apartment in your underwear, Lauren. As in, no clothes. As in, pretty damned close to naked."

She waved a hand dismissively. "It was hot and I wanted to suntan. I forgot my...bathing suit," she explained, her words coming slower as she neared the end of her sentence. "Wait, how would you know about that? I can see his neighbours knowing, but not you."

Picking up the envelope sitting next to him, he tossed it towards her. It landed on her lap and she stopped it from sliding down to the floor with a single hand, before bending to put her drink down on the ground. Slowly, she opened the envelope and removed four color photographs, her jaw dropping as she flipped through them. "Care to explain those?"

"You're sick, you know that? You're really fucking sick!"

"I didn't fucking take them," he shouted back. Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath and pushed his hands through his loose hair, trying to calm himself down. "I checked into my hotel room last night, and this morning, they were waiting for me at the front desk." He knew who had taken them, or at the very least, the person who had paid for someone to take them, and he knew that's where his anger should have been directed. But the second he had looked into the envelope and seen the photographs, he saw red and his anger was immediately misdirected towards his sister. "But I do want to hear your explanation."

She looked down at the pictures, flipping through them again. They looked innocent enough to her, but then she had been there. The sun tanning incident had occurred the first full day they had been at Christian's apartment, before her shopping trip where she had picked up an actual bathing suit to wear. But before that, she had decided to get some sun, taking advantage of a gorgeous Florida day. So she had gone out on the deck, wearing a plain black bra and a pair of black panties. She reasoned that it covered the same areas as a bikini, probably covered more than the bikinis she had back home. Christian had joined her out there an hour later, shirtless but wearing a pair of gym shorts.

Honestly, she couldn't see the problem. They had stayed out there for a good three or so hours, had a few beer, and then went back inside. She could pinpoint each moment in each photograph with perfect clarity. The first, where he was leaning towards her to hand her another beer, although from the angle it was taken, the beer bottle was hidden. The second, where they were looking at each other and laughing over a really bad joke she had told, the sunglasses hiding their rolling eyes. The third, where they were both sitting up rather than lounging, with him examining her hand after she had sworn she had been stung by the bee that had been flying around them for a half hour. The fourth, where they had both been standing, after she had been trying to button the shirt that he had offered her and unable to get the correct buttons in the correct holes thanks to the sun and beer, and he had reached out to help her, jokingly chiding her for not being able to tie her shoes, either.

To her, they looked completely innocent. She couldn't see where her brother was reading more into the pictures. "I already gave you your explanation," she said coolly. "What would you rather, that I tell you how many times we had sex that night?" The infamous Jericho temper, inherited from their father, was growing in both of them. "Do you want the list of which rooms we fucked in? Let me tell you, Chris, he'll never look at his dining room table the same ever again," she lied, enjoying the rising color in his face. "Come on, it's pretty fucking obvious. I mean, there I am in my underwear. It must mean that I'm sleeping with him. Now tell me again how this is _any_ of your fucking business?"

"God forbid I look out for you! I don't remember you giving me this much shit when I offered to give you money for school, so that you wouldn't have to get a loan."

She scoffed. "I always wondered about that," she said softly, knowing how her words were going to feel like they were a slap in the face to him. "I figured that you were never doing it out of the kindness of your heart. You just wanted to look good to everyone else. Big superstar Chris Jericho helping out his little sister in her time of need. Always playing the hero."

"God, you're a bitch."

"And you're an asshole. Is there a reason why we're stating the obvious?"

"Because you're not understanding! You don't get it! You can't trust him, Lauren."

With a bored look on her face, she pushed the photographs back into the envelope and threw it back at him, watching as it hit his chest and slid down to the floor, Chris making no move to stop it. She bent down to pick up her drink again, playing with the straw. "Are we back to this old argument, Chris?" she murmured, looking up at him from beneath her eyelashes. "Christian's not trustworthy. Christian is a sell out. Christian has some devious plan and he's only going to hurt you. Tell me, do you ever get tired of sounding like a broken record? Because I'm more than tired of hearing it. So if you need to rant and rave some more about me and Christian, do it to yourself. I don't want to hear it anymore."

"I'm trying to help you," Chris told her, his teeth grinding together in his anger.

"No. You're trying to smother me. I'm not the idiot you think I am. I'm not some fucking airhead blonde. And you know the funny thing, Christopher? I'm an adult. I'm responsible for my own actions, and I don't need your permission to do anything. I don't even want your input anymore. So honestly, if I want to spend every single waking moment of my time here fucking Christian's brains out, that's my decision."

"Oh my God," he groaned, rolling his eyes.

She rose to her feet gracefully, knowing that she was about to push her brother to his limit, but unable to stop herself. She didn't understand how he couldn't trust her, how he wouldn't believe her. Never mind the fact that they had been like that since she was a kid and he was a teenager. He was always trying to control her life, practically smothering her, trying and failing at trying to be the perfect big brother. Everything she did, he would tell her what she did wrong, how she could do it better. Whatever happened to just being proud of her, happy for her, she wondered.

Crossing her arms, she looked down at him with her lips twisted into a smirk, as she spoke the words that she knew would hurt him the most. "Chris, and I say this with the most love possible: stay the fuck out of my life and stop trying to be my big brother. Because you're only my half brother, and I'm tired of you trying to be more than that."

She had expected him to jump up, to get in her face and shout at her. She had expected him to push his finger in her face and keep fighting. She hadn't expected him to look the way he did, like he was heartbroken at her words. She felt a seed of regret growing in her as his shoulders slumped, the power and strength he normally conveyed disappearing from his body as his head dropped forward. His long blond hair, the curls weighed down by the length, curtained his face from view, but she could hear his sigh.

"I'm done," he said quietly.

"You've said that before," she informed him. "See what I mean? Broken record."

"I mean it this time." He stood as well, keeping his eyes from her as he turned towards the door. "I warned you, Lauren. I told you that if you said that one more time, I was done with you. Congratulations, Lauren, because you really fucked up this time. You made the choice."

"Yeah, I really fucking believe you," she sneered. "You're all talk."

His shoulders shrugged, still turned away from his scowling sister. "And now I'm going to be all action. I tried. God knows I've tried to help you and support you. I've tried to do the best that I could. But I can't keep taking all this abuse. I don't know what your problem has been with me over the years, but you've never ever just appreciated what I've done for you. I just can't care anymore. If you fuck up, don't come running to me, Lauren, 'cause I'm not gonna be there." He walked towards the door and pushed it open, stopping for a moment. "Good luck, Lauren."

She stood there in the silence of the locker room for a moment, her chest heaving as she struggled to control her angry gasping. Her temper had reached its apex and there was no one left for her to take it out on. A growl ripped its way from her throat as she pulled back her hand and threw her drink across the room, watching as it slammed into the wall and spilled over onto the carpet, wishing that Chris had stuck around a little longer, if only so she could have thrown it at him.

* * *

The tension was obvious backstage as the trio waited to walk out. Both Lauren and Chris were quiet and tense, the only difference the expressions on their faces. Chris looked focused on his upcoming tag team match, and Lauren was shooting nasty looks at his back. Never once did he turn to look at her, didn't acknowledge her when she and Christian had come up behind him. He had, however, turned to look at Christian, with a look that was so filled with anger, the other man took a step back in surprise and almost said something.

But he had been informed of the fight, and what had been said, and the last thing he wanted to do was step in and get caught in the family dispute. So he stayed quiet, just like the other two, waiting for their cues.

Chris was informed that he was walking out first, and he climbed the stairs to the stage, pausing briefly when he heard Lauren's voice from behind him. "I'm walking out with Christian," she informed him snidely. He didn't say anything, just rolled his shoulders and bent his head from side to side to loosen his tight muscles, pushing through the black curtain at the correct time. Lauren sneered and flashed her middle finger at the curtain before pulling herself up the stairs and waiting for Christian to join her.

Once they had gone through the curtain, another man stepped out from around the corner, taking his place in front of one of the monitors that would show the action backstage. Steve Austin knew that he could have stayed in his locker room to watch, but he had a feeling that Lauren had something up her sleeve that night, something that he was going to enjoy. When he had handed her the contract, he had a feeling that she was more like her brother than she cared to admit, and had banked on that same intense anger that her brother was well known for.

He stood there, a cold smirk on his face, his arms crossed as he watched the action in the ring. He kept putting Jericho into tag matches, not because he actually cared about one of his employees getting the tag team belts, but because he knew it was pissing off the young man not to be pushed up to main event status, like Austin had originally promised him. The kid was arrogant enough to forget that promises in the business meant nothing. It was an old fashioned business, built on handshake deals that were more ironclad that contracts and promises. There had been no handshake, and he knew that Jericho was kicking himself in the ass for that.

But both Jericho and Christian were good. One day, a few years from then, he had no problem believing that both of them would be top level talent, able to go toe to toe with some of the best in the business. If he allowed that to happen, of course. And he had no intentions of letting it happen. They were both athletic and talented men. And Lauren Jericho...well, she would be his greatest conquest in his plans. Her contacting him was like having the future dropped into his lap, gift-wrapped and tied with a pretty red ribbon. If only she knew what he had given her.

His smirk became bigger as he watched the match. Things had been going well for the two blond men, and it looked like they were going to win, before Lauren climbed up onto the ring apron, completely oblivious to the referee. The crowd reacted loudly as she ducked between the ropes and stood behind one of their opponents, waiting until the referee caught sight of her out of the corner of his eye. Her glance was on her brother the entire time as she tapped the member of the opposing team on the shoulder, waiting for Jeff Hardy to turn and look at her, before she pulled back her fist and slammed it into his jaw. The cameras focused on her as the bell rang and the match was called in the Hardys favour, due to disqualification.

Her job done, the camera followed her as she rolled out of the ring and landed on the protective padding outside, heading up the ramp without her brother or Christian in tow.

Oh yeah, signing her had definitely been worth it.


	10. Chapter Nine

**Bound and Chained: Edge of Reason  
Chapter Nine**

It was a long four months before brother and sister spoke again. And it was four, uncomfortable months for all those involved.

It wasn't that they didn't speak to each other at all, but their conversations were short, and always had to do with match strategy. They wouldn't even so much as mutter an _excuse me_ to each other when they would block each other's progress in the locker room. And it wasn't just that she could switch locker rooms or refuse to walk out with him. Lauren had gone to Steve Austin about to, had pleaded with him, and was told that she was "shit outta luck" as far as he was concerned. Whenever she could, she walked out with Christian, but she also had to walk out with her brother whenever he had a match, if she wasn't injured.

There had been two more incidents of her getting injured in those four months, though neither was as bad as the first time. She had been used as a shield once by Chris, thinking that if his opponent who happened to be Edge that night had seen her standing there, he would stop, but he couldn't stop his momentum. She had caught the clothesline closer to her throat than on her chest and had glared for a good week at her brother, using her raspy voice and showing off the slight bruising whenever she could. The second was when she had been distracted at ringside by something that was shouted out in the crowd, and when her head had turned, a referee had been thrown from the ring and slammed into her, causing her head to slam into the padded security barrier. She found out that it certainly wasn't as padded as she thought it was. That night had left her with a concussion and an on-again, off-again headache for a few days.

For the most part, however, Lauren was left alone by Jericho's opponents. She had a habit of climbing in the ring every now and then and pulling the same trick she had: wait for the referee to see her, throw a weak punch or kick at his opponent and cost him the match, all while staring her brother down. There weren't many people that got angry with her for it, because her punches and kicks were half-hearted, only enough to get her brother disqualified, and the general consensus of the locker room was that Chris Jericho was an asshole that deserved to lose every chance he got. She had kept up on her ring training with Christian, but she had yet to actually use an offensive or defensive move against anyone, other than her punch or kick.

She stayed out of matches that involved Christian, such as the tag team match for the title belts. They hadn't won, the Hardys had retained their belts, and Austin stopped booking the two men in tag matches, Instead, Christian had been vying for a number one contenders spot for the Intercontinental title, held by none other than his own brother Edge, and Chris...well, Chris wasn't wrestling for any title. He was just wrestling.

Thier locker room was certainly divided. Christian and Lauren were still as thick as thieves, possibly closer than they were before, while Chris usually left the room and went elsewhere. The times that all three were together would have been amusing to an outsider that just happened to walk into the room. When they looked at each other, trying to avoid each other's eyes, Chris would look almost sorrowful, like he wanted to say something to her but didn't want to be the one to break the uncomfortable silence. Lauren, on the other hand, would glower at him, staring daggers at his back.

And then, the one thing happened that Lauren was most frightened about. Christian was injured in a match. He had landed awkwardly after being thrown by his much larger opponent, halfway across the ring, and while he had still picked up the win, there was no denying that his left hand and wrist had been bothering him. The trainers backstage had sent him to a local emergency room to get it checked out, and the news hadn't been promising: a sprained wrist and a bone in the hand broken in two places, expect to be out for three to four weeks to allow for healing. He had been fitted with a plaster splint, given a bottle of painkillers, lost his place in the contender's race, and was sent home to rest up. Which left Lauren alone.

The road became a very lonely place for Lauren. She had gone to talk to Austin, who had treated her a hell of a lot more kindly since she started to cost her brother his matches, and had asked for time off as well. He had essentially laughed in her face and sent her on her way, telling her again that no matter what her problems with Chris were, she was still his valet, and they still had to share a locker room. She had sneered and flounced out of the room, and just to spite her boss that night, who had told her he enjoyed seeing her get in the ring and interfere, she had stood at ringside, completely immobile, while Chris picked up the pinfall in his match.

She had no travel partner, no friend to sit in the passenger seat and endlessly flip through radio stations while looking for something good, no one to hang out with before and after shows, no one to climb in the ring with her as soon as it was set up and roll around in a pretence of training. Her scowl rarely left her face. Her hotel rooms were changed to single bookings, she drove the rental cars herself, and she devoured a large number of books, on Christian's recommendations, while on airplanes or waiting for the show to start. She reasoned that she was becoming as voracious a reader as Christian was, despite the fact that she rarely read for pleasure.

They traded phone calls back and forth, usually on her new cell phone before the show, but they quickly died down, what with Christian's annoyance at being injured and forced to sit around at home, and Lauren's growing depression at being left alone on the road with nothing but an angry brother and a boss that she didn't trust.

She had been with the WWF for almost six months in total, making Chris's life a living hell as best she could for six whole months, before Austin brought her into his locker room one night to discuss another contract with her.

Lauren stared down at paper with a confused look. "My contract isn't up," she told him, before putting it down on her lap. "We had a deal for a year. That's all."

Austin grunted as he sat down across from her. "Uh huh. That's an extension."

She rolled her eyes. "Okay, but we had a deal for twelve months, nothing more and nothing less. I've come, my brother is fine other than being a raging jackass, and I've fulfilled my end of the bargain thus far. I have no intentions of staying with the WWF. I plan on going back to law school and finishing."

Cocking his head, Steve Austin gave her a cold smile. "From what I hear, you ain't got no more financial help with that. Seems that your half-brother doesn't want anything to do with you anymore. Not to say that I could blame him, considering everything you've done to make sure he loses. And I like it. You've got spunk. You've got a bit of fire in you."

"Thanks," she said drily.

His eyebrows raised. "Now, that was a compliment that I gave you, Lauren. You may treat your brother like that, but you should respect me. Don't forget, I'm in control of your time here."

She bit back a comment about how he was dancing on the edge of blackmail, and instead, plastered a smile on her face. "Thank you," she tried again.

"That's better." Austin nodded towards the contract. "Now, let's try this again. That is an extension to your contract. In case you hadn't noticed, in your contract, there's an option to renew. I get first dibs. And I think you should stick around a little longer. Besides, you're gonna need money for school, aren't you?"

"No offense, _sir_, but this is making me feel like a damned prostitute." She lifted the paper from her lap and put it down beside her on the couch. "I'm sorry, I don't want to be here anymore. I'm going to fulfill the remaining obligation of my contract and that's it. After that, I'm going back home and I'm going back to school. I already sent for paperwork for a student loan. My credit is good. I may have to pay for it the rest of my life, but I'll get it."

Another grunt. "You've never had to work for anything in your life, have you, other than getting decent grades in school."

Her eyes narrowed. "How did you know that? About my grades, I mean?"

The look he gave her was clear: _you're an idiot_. She bristled when she saw it. "You're in law school, aren't you? I'd think that you'd need some sort of decent grades to get in there to begin with. But besides that, you haven't had to work for anything. You've had everything handed to her, probably by your dad, and now by your brother. Except no one...no one but me...is handing you anything anymore."

"And what am I being handed now? Another year of fighting with Chris, of getting thrown around the ring like a rag doll, of a whole arena full of people calling me a bitch and a slut? Yeah, that sounds like a life that I really want." She shook her head, brushing her hair out of the way when it fell into her eyes. "Like I said, I signed a one year contract. I will fulfill the obligations of my contract, but beyond that, I'm done. I hate this place. I hate everything about this place. I don't like the travel, I don't like the people, I don't like anything here. And when my contract is up, I'm probably going to celebrate. Hell, I'm gonna throw a party."

A cold smile started to spread on his face. "And what about your little friend?"

"Who, Christian? I probably wouldn't have even given him a second look had I met him elsewhere. I'll miss him. I miss him now, but that's what phones and e-mail are for." She laughed suddenly, derisively. "It doesn't matter what you try. I'm not signing another contract. Or an extension, whatever the hell you want to call it. It's as simple as that."

"You're sure about that?" he asked.

Standing up, Lauren nodded her head. "I'm sure. Are we done?"

* * *

Later that night, she shouldn't have been so sure. Later that night, she started to kick herself for what she had said. Because she should have known better. She had seen many sides of Steve Austin since she had started to work for him, but the side he usually showed was his more sadistic side. His angry side. The side that reappeared that night.

It wasn't long after her meeting with Austin that she popped down to the catering area, intent on getting a cup of coffee and checking the match listings that were posted outside the door. She had smiled when she saw that Chris wasn't scheduled to wrestle anyone that night, and had cheerfully returned to the locker room, gathered her stuff, and had informed him that she was going back to the hotel, since he "wasn't important enough to actually get a match" on the show.

Back at the hotel, she had turned on the television and switched to the channel that was going to be playing Raw later that night, and had bided her time until the show, filling in the word search in a local newspaper, taking a shower, and reading another few pages of the latest book recommendation that Christian had given her. When the show had started, she alternated her time between reading and watching, never keeping her attention of either for more than a few minutes. As much as she didn't want to admit it, after spending six months with the company, she was becoming more and more a fan of wrestling, even if she really didn't want a part in it herself.

The first match barely garnered her attention, a women's fight between Lita and Trish Stratus, a beautiful blonde that Lauren had yet to run into backstage. She muttered to herself about Trish being a Barbie doll wannabe and went back to her book, frustrated that she wasn't finding it as interesting as her friend had. It wasn't until after the match was over that Lauren's attention was brought back to the television.

"And later tonight," one of the commentator's was saying, "Chris Jericho will go one-on-one against the seven foot, three hundred pound Kane."

On the one hand, she was amused. Chris, compared to regular people, was pretty big. Compared to those in the wrestling industry, he was considered small. At only six feet tall, he had to look up to a majority of the locker room. Having to look up and stare at a seven foot tall man would be amusing. But on the other hand, she was pissed, and grabbed her cell phone from where she had left it on the night stand, finding his number in her directory.

She waited for him to pick up, and when he didn't, she waited for his voice mail. "Hey. You've got me. Leave me a message, I'll get back to you."

Rolling her eyes at his brief message, she heard the beep and started to unleash. "You jackass. The least you could've done is call me to let me know that the match listings changed. If I get in trouble for not being there, I swear to God, I'm gonna kill you. I don't have enough time to make it back there now. You suck. Oh, and, uh, good luck tonight," she added snidely before hanging up and dropping the phone beside her. She could only imagine what Austin's reaction was going to be when she wasn't there to walk out with him.

She sat through half of the show, her arms crossed under her breasts and a sulking expression on her face, glowering at the television screen. If she couldn't be there to see it live and in person, she could at least watch as her brother got his ass handed to him by the much larger and stronger man.

She perked up a bit when Kane's music started to play and he appeared at the top of the ramp. She couldn't help but roll her eyes at the theatrics of the entrance, what with the flames coming from the ringposts, but she knew that if she had happened to be outside the ring during then, she probably would have jumped and screamed, much to the amusement of everyone around. She narrowed her eyes again as the music shut off and a long moment of silence started.

Chris's theme started to play, and the ring announcer began introducing him, but when the lights came up, he was nowhere to be found. She snorted as she watched, wondering if maybe he had left the arena that night as well after finding out that he didn't have a match. A smile started to grow on her face as she thought about how she could take advantage of a little trick like that when they started to play his music again, in hopes that he would come out.

But he didn't, and instead, the camera focused on the large screen over the ramp, where it focused on one of the open locker room doors. She started to chuckle, thinking about how pissed Austin was going to be when the camera showed that there was no one and nothing in the room, Chris probably in his hotel room and sleeping, when the laughter died on her lips. Because there _was_ someone in the locker room, and the bottom of the boots looked very familiar to Lauren. Her eyes widened and she leaned forward on the bed, wanting to yell at the camera operator to move faster and show the entire room. And when he did, she regretted it.

The place had been suitably trashed. The small table that had been in there was broken in half, a chair thrown haphazardly across the room and with a large dent in it that she assumed would match the size of her brother's head. His familiar looking duffel bag was in the middle of the floor, and his clothes spilling out of it. She turned away when she saw blood and heard her cell phone ring.

"Yeah?" she asked as she answered it, not looking down at the caller identification screen.

"You're okay," Christian said on the other end. "Are you at the arena?"

"No," she said softly. "Chris didn't have a match tonight. I went back to the hotel. It's bad, isn't it? I can't look."

He sighed on the other end of the line. "It probably just looks worse than it is. It's okay, they went to commercial. You don't have to keep your eyes closed."

"Worse than it looks? I saw blood. That's gotta be pretty damned bad," she told him.

He was quiet for a good minute, and when he finally did speak, he sounded tentative. "Lauren, do me a favour. Actually, do yourself one. Check on him. Make sure he's okay." She remained silent, not even the sound of her breathing transmitting over the phone line. "He's your brother. I know that you guys aren't getting along, but he's still your brother. Put all of this bullshit behind you and go see him."

Lauren plucked at the coverlet of the bed, frowning. "You sound like a complete hypocrite. I hope you realize that," she said softly, her discomfort evident in her voice.

"I know. But you and Chris are different from me and my brother. And I know you, at least well enough to know that you won't be calm until you see that he's okay. Please, Lauren. Do the right thing here."

"What if he's not okay?" she whispered.

"He will be."

* * *

It had taken four phone calls until Lauren got the news that she wanted: Chris had been sent to a local emergency room by the backstage medical staff, in order to be examined and treated for signs of concussion. She managed to get ahold of one of the trainers, who had accompanied Chris to the hospital, and received a phone call around midnight, informing her that he had been diagnosed with a grade one concussion, was stitched up in two places, and was being sent back to the hotel. As soon as she hung up, she hurried down to the hotel lobby with as much personal identification as she had with her, and lucked out by talking with a sympathetic desk clerk who happened to be a wrestling fan. Within minutes, she had secured a key card to her brother's room and went back up to wait for him.

Forty minutes after the last phone call, she was perched uncomfortably on the end of the bed, biting her lip and tugging on her hair when the door to the room finally opened. She heard a soft curse from her brother and jumped up, rushing to the door. As it closed and he looked up, she ran at him, throwing her arms around his waist. "You're okay," she breathed. "Jesus, Christopher, I was so worried."

He stood there for a moment, his arms at his sides, before he finally relented with a sigh, returning her frantic hug. "This is what it takes for you to talk to me again? I should've gotten myself beat up weeks ago." She laughed against his chest and he wasn't surprised to hear her sniffle. "C'mon, Lauren. Much as I appreciate this, I really need to sit down."

She hurriedly released him and stepped to the side as he started past her, limping and wincing. As soon as he was sitting down, she looked over him with a critical eye. "You're still wearing your tights."

He groaned and pushed his hair out of his face, making a face when he felt the stitches in his forehead pull at the motion. "Yeah, nothing more manly than walking through the hotel lobby at one in the morning, wearing spandex. One of the trainers grabbed my bag. I can pick it up in the morning." He paused and took a deep breath, leaning forward to start unstrapping his shin guards, making a face at the protest of his bruised and pulled muscles. "Can you get my other glasses out of my bag? I can't see a fucking thing, and I lost my contacts sometime tonight. And maybe something to change into, too, if you don't mind."

"No, no, of course not," she said, going over to his suitcase. She found the other pair of eyeglasses that he carried with him for emergency purposes, stacking it atop the underwear, sweatpants, and tee shirt that she grabbed. When she turned back, he had removed the shin guards and one of his boots, leaning back to take a break before starting again. Making a face at him, she left the bundle beside him and knelt down near his feet, making quick work of removing the other boot and helping to tug down his knee pads. "Do you need help getting changed?" she asked.

He twirled a finger. "Turn around. I can do this, it'll just be slow going." She turned and kept her back to him, patiently waiting until he said he was finished. Lauren spun around to see Chris sitting on the bed, having changed into everything but the tee shirt. Making a face, she went over to the heater in the room and turned it up slightly to compensate for the fact that he hadn't put on the shirt. "Thanks, Laurie."

She looked down and twisted her fingers together. "No problem. So, what did they say? At the hospital, I mean."

"I have the rest of the week off, and barring any complications, I can be back to work next Monday. I'm gonna book a flight back home, go see my own doctor. Guess that means you're off for the week, too, since Christian and I are both off now." He smiled, and it was a bit strained. "Look, um, I'm not really supposed to be alone tonight, just in case. I signed out _against medical advice_, 'cause it's only a concussion, but - "

Lauren waved a hand, cutting him off. "No, it's completely cool. I can stay here with you." She laughed suddenly, softly. "It's going to be the first time since that stupid trip up to the cabin when I was a kid that we're going to have to share a bed. You don't still snore, do you?"

"Better question is if you still do," he said in return, his smile becoming a little more genuine. She laughed as she rounded the bed, pulling back the covers for both of them. Chris caught her wrist in his hand, stopping her movements. "Yeah?"

"We need to talk, but I can't do it tonight. Come back to Florida with me, stay at my house. Or get a hotel room, if you're not comfortable with that. But come back with me. We have a lot of stuff to work through. And there's a few things that you probably need to know about me."

Lauren nodded, pulling her hand away from him. "All right. But if we kill each other in the meantime, don't blame me."

The only response she got was the megawatt, shit eating grin that Chris Jericho was so well known for.


	11. Chapter Ten

**Bound and Chained: Edge of Reason  
Chapter Ten**

Lauren walked back to the wooden steps that led to the backyard, sitting down as Chris passed her a bottle of beer. "Thanks," she said, looking down to see that he had removed the cap. He grunted and pushed his thumb into the middle of the cap, folding the metal in half before tossing it towards a metal can nearby. They both watched as it bounced on the rim and then fell in. "The steaks are almost done," she informed him, taking a sip.

"Don't poke 'em so much. You'll make them dry out."

She narrowed her eyes. "Would you rather do the cooking?" He narrowed his own eyes in return and glared at her, pretending to pout. "Yeah, that's right, I didn't think so. Leave it to the woman to do all the cooking," she teased, throwing her arms out dramatically.

Chris chuckled. "It's not my fault that I got the crap beaten out of me backstage. I managed to get down to this step, and I don't plan on getting off of it anytime soon."

With a sigh, Lauren turned away and looked over the backyard, unremarkable save for the handful of orange trees in the corner. Her attention was briefly pulled away by the radio, where they were informed that the Tampa Bay Lightning had scored against their opponents by a yelling announcer. "So, it was Austin, huh?" she asked.

He made a face and plucked at the label on his own beer bottle. "Yeah. Well, he blindsided me, but I know it was him. It was his style. He went straight for my head, too. Stunned me good enough that I couldn't fight back, and then finished off the job. The fucker," he spat out, looking at her from the corner of his eye. "You don't look surprised, and you sure as hell didn't sound surprised when I told you."

Her eyes went down to her lap, examining a fading bruise on her thigh. The bruises were coming fewer and farther between as her body adjusted to the work that she and Christian had been putting in before he was injured. "Not really. I had a feeling that you were going to finger him, and I have no reason not to believe you. Besides, he's kinda creepy."

Snorting, Chris tipped back the bottle and drained the neck before wiping his hand across his mouth, stifling a burp. "Understatement of the damned century," he muttered. A new thought occurred to him, and he whipped his head around to stare at her. "Has he touched you?"

"Austin? No," she lied, meeting his eyes. She had always been good at lying to Chris. She knew exactly how her brother would have reacted if she had said yes. Injuries be damned, he would have been back at the first show possible in order to retaliate, probably doing himself more harm and possibly putting her in more harm than she had been before. No, that was the last thing that she wanted. "God, that guy is twisted."

"I thought he was offering me the world on a silver platter. I mean, c'mon, it's Stone Cold. He helped make the business what it is today. But now he's gunning for me, and I don't have a fucking clue as to why. Now he's got you involved, too. I don't think it's anything personal with you, but he really hates me."

She shrugged her shoulders, looking straight ahead. "Hate by association, I guess. He probably couldn't believe his good luck when he picked up the phone that first time. I'm really starting to regret ever tracking down him number now."

"Starting?" Chris questioned, a bit of a smile growing on his lips, though it was tinged with disbelief. "You've been slammed down to the mat from the second turnbuckle by a guy who's twice your weight, you've been pulled into the ring by your hair twice, you caught a clothesline in the throat from a guy barrelling at you like a freight train, and you've had a referee use you as a landing pad. And you're just starting to regret it."

Turning to look at him, she tried to look as innocent as possible, knowing that she was failing. "I'm a professional wrestler," she said in a saccharine voice.

"Bullshit, Laurie. Your halo doesn't hit over your horns." She chuckled with him.

"Yeah, well, those injuries are all your fault. Especially the clothesline. I still can't believe that you used me as a shield."

His brow furrowed as he shot her a look that was as innocent as hers had been, although she had to admit that he looked more angelic than she ever could. The blond hair and blue eyes gave him an advantage over her darker features. "If Edge could've stopped, he would have. He didn't mean to hit you. Trust me, I used to know the guy, and if I'm not mistaken, he apologized when he did hit you."

"Okay, we're talking about Edge here. The guy who had absolutely no qualms about throwing Lita around the year before." Lauren grinned at his incredulous expression. "Go me brushing up on my wrestling history. Christian's been working me hard."

"Gross," he muttered with a shake of his head. He watched as she popped back up to check on the steaks on the barbecue once more, before coming back and licking her thumb free of barbecue sauce as she sat down on the step below him. "That's another thing. I don't really know where Christian stands on this whole Austin deal. I have no idea what Austin promised him, but whatever it was, it's pretty obvious that he hasn't come through on it. I was in this before Christian was, and I still don't know what was going through his head."

Lauren sighed and leaned back against the step, tipping her head back to look in the sky. It was cooler than the last time she had been out in Florida, but the sky was still blue and cloudy, just with a cool breeze coming in off the water. During her last visit, which had been to Christian's apartment, she had lived in cut-offs and tank tops. At Chris's house, later in the year, they were both wearing long pants and sweatshirts, though she had the sleeves pushed up to her elbows. "Maybe it's the same as you," she ventured. "Maybe Austin promised him a title and just hasn't come through on it. Not that he would," she added as an afterthought.

Chris shook his head, pushing away a piece of hair that fell out of his ponytail and fell into his face. "I don't know. I mean, Christian had his hands on gold a few times. Granted, it was tag team, but they were the perfect team. It's like the Hardys. There's no one who knows you better than your own brother. Or sister, as the case may be," he said, flashing her a quick smile. "As far as I know, when this all happened, Christian wasn't too interested in singles gold. He had no problem with Edge having the occasional singles match, but for the most part, they were a team and they were staying that way."

"Odd that he would go after Christian and not one of the Hardys. Aren't they just as successful?"

"Kinda. Edge and Christian have been at it for a bit longer, but yeah. They're coming up in the ranks a lot more now that one of the top teams is broken up. But I don't think it has to do with just breaking up teams. That doesn't explain me, 'cause I wasn't part of an actual tag team. I just did the occasional tag match."

Lauren blew out her breath slowly, her mind racing with possibilities. "I was going to say that this is like being in high school all over again, but really, it seems like the WWF is a soap opera. Just with more muscles and less poisonings."

"Don't say that backstage. You might give Austin a few ideas," he warned, unable to keep the grin off of his face.

She sipped her beer and put it down beside her, digging her bare toes into the grass. "Cute, Christopher. But shall we get back to the topic at hand? How we fix this situation?"

"I know how to fix your situation, kind of. I don't know what to do about mine. All you have to do is keep out of Austin's way until your contract is up. Six more months and you're free. I, on the other hand, signed my life away. Or at least, another two and a half years of it."

Her shoulders slumped. "A four year contract? Isn't there any way out of it?"

"Oh, sure," he offered flippantly. "A serious enough injury to keep me out of wrestling permanently, dismemberment, and death. Considering that I'm in the best shape of my life and have no bad habits or addictions, I'm praying that a bus hits me." She swatted him on the leg, one place she was sure of that wasn't bruised or sore. "If I buy the bullet, will you shoot me?"

"Not unless you piss me off," she offered with a sweet smile, before rolling her eyes and shaking her head. "Can we not talk about you dying, please? Those steaks smell really good, and I don't want to ruin my dinner. You want to eat out here or did you want to go in the house?"

"Here's fine," he said, watched as she stood up again. He sat there, listening as she walked in and out of the house, gathering the condiments and plates, before she handed him a large plate filled with food. "Are you trying to make me fat?" he asked, taking the fork and steak knife from her as she went to retrieve her own dinner.

Smiling as she sat down, she put the plate on her knees and reached for the salad dressing. "That's the plan. Maybe if I get you fat enough, Austin will fire you." Her smile brightened. "Hey, wait, there we go! Get yourself fired."

He shook his head as he cut into his steak, checking to make sure that she had cooked it medium rare, the way he liked it. "Been there, done that. And hey, look what it gets me. A forced vacation and a concussion."

"Well, it was an idea. I don't hear you coming up with any."

"I have ideas," Chris protested. Swallowing his mouthful of food, he licked the barbecue sauce off of his bottom lip. "But I don't really want to go to jail for murder, so you know, there go half of them." He was quiet for a moment as he prodded his baked potato, before reaching for the container of sour cream she had brought out. If he was going to have a cheat day with his diet, he might as well go all out, he figured. When he spoke next, he chose his words carefully, like he was picking his way through a verbal minefield. "I may have something up my sleeve. Something that I've been working on for awhile. Out of the frying pan and into the fire, I guess, but it's something."

She peered up at him from over her shoulder. "Something that you can tell your sister?"

Chris hesitated. "I _can_ tell you, but I'm not _going_ to. I've gotten you in enough trouble already. If Dad were still around, he'd probably tell me that he could still take me out behind the woodshed, and he'd most likely make good on that threat. It's best to keep you out of it."

Lauren opened her mouth to protest, and for the first time since she had come to work in the WWF, she bit back her pride and stopped herself from speaking for a moment. Her brother gave her a surprised look as he realized what had happened, and considered clapping his hands for her for a moment, and then deciding against it. He didn't want to break the tenuous truce they had made. "The best thing about that is that we really did have a woodshed," she said instead.

They were both quiet for a moment, listening to the radio play-by-play as the second period in the Tampa Bay Lightning game started. "They have a decent team this year," Chris offered.

She shrugged. "If it isn't the Canucks or the Red Wings, I tend not to pay a lot of attention to them."

"So, you're okay with me not telling you?" he asked suddenly, unable to quell his curiosity.

"I don't like it, but I understand it. I even respect your decision. Who thought those words would ever come out of my mouth?" Lauren laughed. "You've got something else on your mind, Chris. What is it?"

He sighed unhappily, moving his plate to the side before reaching into the cooler near him for another beer. "Did you really come here for me?" he asked, uncapping the new bottle and folding the cap again. She nodded. "Really? You had no other reasons?"

Lauren turned on the step to face him. "Christopher, you're the only family that I have left now that Dad's gone. Maybe a few years ago, yeah, I would have been playing some sort of angle, but not now. I've changed a lot lately. I don't really have any friends besides Christian and I'm beginning to doubt that now, and all that's left of my family is my big brother and a mother that I've never met. I just want to keep us together. I want to keep the family together."

His expression softened as he passed over the napkin sitting on his knee, watching as she wiped at her brimming eyes. "I believe you, Laurie, I really do. But you do realize how hard it's been for me having you here, right? Everything that I've done, I've done to try and protect you. Even before this, what with helping you with university and law school. I wanted to keep you safe, and instead, I brought you here."

"I brought myself here," she murmured.

"You wouldn't have come if I hadn't have acted like such an ass towards you. All I had to do was answer one or two of your phone calls and this never would have happened."

"But it did happen, Chris. And you know us. We're tough, it's how we were raised. We'll get through this. We've gotten through everything else so far."

Rolling his eyes, he picked up his plate and situated it back on his lap. "This is a little different than the neighbours thinking that we were unruly kids."

Lauren smiled at him, and he couldn't help but marvel at how hopeful she looked. Maybe she really had changed. "Yeah, but we're on the same team now, Chris. Austin won't be able to stop us."

He wished that he could believe the same thing.

* * *

The week passed quickly, and within a few days, Chris was cleared to compete again. For the first time since Lauren had been on the road, she split a rental car and a hotel room with her brother rather than her usual traveling partner, Christian. She was used to Christian, the way he'd tap his fingers on the steering wheel or the dashboard to the beat of whatever song was playing, depending on what seat he was in. She knew what restaurants he liked to stop at, and how he liked to actually go in and sit down to eat. She knew which bed he preferred in the hotel rooms, and where he put his shaving kit and his books.

She wasn't prepared for Chris. She wasn't ready for his loud music, with the bass turned up loud enough that she swore she could feel it in her fillings, and the lyrics almost but not quite distorted by the thumps. She wasn't ready for his spur of the moment stops, where he'd give her a grin, find the nearest drive-through and demand that it was time for a milkshake. When she took over in the driver's seat for the second leg of the trip, she was surprised when he let her take control of the radio, but she hadn't expected him to occasionally sing along, at the top of his lungs and off-key in an attempt to make her smile.

Smile she did. Chris practically had her in hysterics the entire trip, bringing her back to the days of the old family road trips, where they'd be stuck in the backseat together and Chris had to play babysitter and keep her entertained. Back then and now again as they were older, Chris was willing to make a fool out of himself to cheer her up. She didn't need cheering up, exactly. She wasn't upset or angry, but rather thoughtful, unable to stop thinking about everything she had been told over the week, things that she had known or suspected, and things that were still unclear.

Her frown had become deeper when Christian had called their first day back on the road to tell her that he was cleared to come back the following week. She had echoed his words for the benefit of Chris, and she forced a wide smile on her face, in hopes that it would make her sound more cheerful than she felt. She hadn't been sure if it had worked or not, but he hadn't sounded suspicious of anything, and had only laughed and asked if she and her brother had killed each other yet. When she hung up the phone, she passed it blindly back to Chris to put into her bag as she turned the corner towards the arena that Monday Night Raw was being held in.

"We still have a week to figure out what to do, Laurie," he told her, as he straightened out from twisting towards the backseat to put her phone away. She glanced over at him and sighed, before flicking on the turn signal and getting into the proper lane. "And as much as you don't want to hear this - "

"Don't start out that way," she said, the frown back on her face. She scowled at the car ahead of her and waited for the green light. "It never sounds good when you start out a sentence like that."

"When Christian comes back, you're going to be staying with him, right?" Chris asked.

She made a face. "I thought I was going to be staying with you. Or will I be cramping your style with the ring rats?" she asked in return.

He snorted. "Yeah, sure. I get so much action, I'm surprised I can walk," he said drily, rolling his eyes behind his aviator style prescription sunglasses. A girlish scream caught his attention from outside his slightly open window, and he turned towards it, smiling and waving at the women in the car the next lane over. Lauren leaned over to look as well and laughed at the enthusiastic women calling out her brother's name and declaring their love for him, before she pulled the car smoothly ahead. "See?" Chris said, pointing towards the car as they were pulling away. His outstretched finger only caused them to yell louder.

"It's been that long, has it?" she murmured in mock sympathy, clucking her tongue at him as he moved his hand away from the window and folded the finger he had used to point, before flashing the one beside it at her, making her laugh as he flipped her off. "I thought you said that you didn't trust Christian."

"I don't," he said, settling back down as the arena loomed into view. They had hit a late lunch rush, it seemed, and traffic was crawling to a stop every few car lengths. Chris adjusted his seat so it was leaning back more, and shrugged. "I don't trust him because I don't know where he stands."

"Uh huh. You don't trust him, but you want me to stay with him. Does this have anything to do with all those mysterious phone calls of yours?" she asked, smiling broadly when his expression let her know she hit the nail on the head. "You realize how fucked up that sounds, right?"

"God, since when do you curse so much? Mom would've torn a strip off your hide if she heard you now. But yeah, I think you should keep rooming with him. Come on, Lauren, keep your friends close but your enemies closer? I don't know if he's an enemy, but it's a good idea to know what he's up to."

She made a face and changed lanes again, before she was forced to stop the car. "I don't know if I could. I mean, knowing what I know now, knowing that he could be on Austin's side...how could I act normally around him?"

He nudged her when traffic started again. "He's still your friend, Laurie. Just keep reminding yourself of that, and you should be fine. But if it does turn out that he's working for Austin, just remember that in this business, friends come and go like crazy. Seriously, it's like a revolving door business or something. In and out."

Lauren pretended to gag. "Ew, gross!" she squealed indignantly.

"Oh, you're sick. Not everything is about sex."

"We're from Manitoba, Christopher Keith, not Arkansas. I don't need to hear sex talk coming from you." She turned off towards the arena, and slowed down near the security gate, rolling down her window to pass over both her and her brother's identification and security passes, waiting as they were checked off the list and told to go ahead. "Hey, you wanna go and roll around in the ring for a bit before the show? I feel like I've been slacking without Christian being here," she said as she rolled the window back up and folded the directions to the parking area. She found a spot near the door and eased into it before turning off the engine.

"Only if you want me to kick your ass."

"Bring it."


End file.
